Customer Reviews

Teach Yourself Italian Complete Course Package (Book + 2CDs) (Teach Yourself Language Complete Courses)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I started to study Italian by myself from an old book I found at home, so I knew the basics. This course (book and 2 cd's) suits me very well. I am not sure it will be useful for total beginners - it may be too fast at the start. I like the dialogues which are simulations of conversations any tourist may need, on one side, and the more serious parts dealing with grammar etc. The course is advancing at a good pace, never overwhelming the student with too much information.
The different chapters are just the right length and at the end of each there is some useful information about Italy, including references to websites for more details.
I bought the Pimsleur course and found it a total disappointment. The Teach Yourself Italian is much cheaper and provides very good value per money. Highly recommended
I gave it only 4 stars, because I would like the cd's to contain more pronounciation exercises, but you can still learn a lot as it is.

Great product but a funny thing i noticed looking at the book: it's published in the UK so that makes the pronunciation examples a little off for those of us in the US. For example, on page 6 under Pronunciation it says that the "a" in Italian is pronounced like "bat." In the UK, bat isn't pronounced with the "flat a" sound, as in apple, but instead is more of an "ah" sound (which is the correct sound for the Italian a). The same is true for the pronunciation of the "o." In the US, it's a flatter o sound than in the UK, so pretend you're from the UK for that one as well. After listening to the CD, which uses voices with a UK accent, it'll be easy to understand the difference and make the adjustment so that it's the correct Italian sound. I joke that i'm learning Italian with a UK accent.... There are other fun things about the book because of its UK publishing. I'll let you discover the others!

Simple household technology that we take for granted nowadays has made a world of difference to learning modern languages. To be able to listen to the language properly spoken with the book open in front of us turns what used to require a school course of 5 or 6 years in my time into a process requiring only days for a comparatively simple language such as Italian.

I'm not suggesting for one moment that the few hours I gave to this course have turned me into a fluent speaker of Italian. What I do say is that this course has taken me to the point of basic competence in the time that 50 years ago would have been needed for me to master a few horrid little phrases, at the level of A Cat Sat On A Mat. In my day the teaching of modern languages was like the Monty Python sketch about the rat pie - great detail on how to catch, kill and skin your rat, then when you come to the bit you really want it says `You then make it into a pie'. When learning a modern language in the 50's we used to have to grind through all manner of pedestrian detail and unusable vocabulary only to find ourselves totally at sea when confronted with the language in its proper setting. One of the better things about this course is that the speakers talk about things most visitors to Italy would expect to talk about. There are exceptions of course. Not only is this a book and cd for family consumption, there seems to be nothing telling us how to ask to find the lavatory, for instance. However they have got away from the strange preoccupation that old-style primers used to have with traffic accidents - `See, the train has left the rails' and that kind of thing. Another of the better aspects is that we are listening to authentic pronunciation: I went through an entire school course in French without realising that French has a pitch-accent not a stress-accent and that all syllables are of more or less the same length. Just to have been told that once would have made all the difference, but the best way of all is to hear Italian spoken clearly and without rush, so that its special way with pitch, stress and the length of sounds is there for us to learn and imitate.

Many of us find that it is easier at first to grasp the language in writing than from speech, and that we get more information from La Repubblica than from television when it comes to the news. As far as that's concerned, I would reinforce the point about listening carefully. Italians tend to talk quickly (in particular women TV presenters rattle away like woodpeckers for some reason) but Italian is a language that makes for distinctness when spoken, and if you have got your ears accustomed to the proper sound of it you may be surprised how quickly you start adapting. Don't expect it to be effortless - there is no escape from learning the verbs by rote, for one thing, so just do that and don't expect it brought to you on a tray involving no work on your own part.

There is a short Italian-English and a significantly shorter English-Italian vocabulary at the back of the book. This is as it should be. Trying to learn a foreign language by looking up English words is the wrong way to try to do it, and this course is right in giving us no encouragement to. My advice is to follow the course methodically from start to finish. If you do that you will soon be better at Italian than I am.

This text and CD set gives a decent practical introduction to Italian, with clear and manageable grammar information. I would estimate that it is equivalent to a college semester of a language, if you learn this text well.

CDs give very clear and lovely examples of Italian conversational speech. One can follow along in the text; this is very helpful.

The format of the text, however, makes it somewhat difficult to review, and there isn't even a vocabulary list at the end of each chapter! This is a serious flaw. I would prefer also extensive review exercises at the end of the chapter. Instead, there are only small practice sessions embedded in the the text. I would like this format--it makes it seem manageable--if only there were also review sections at the end.

This book was easy to use as well. I have a very special friend in my life and he wanted to learn my first language. This book worked really well for him, we both had a lot of fun learning together!!

This book is very good and for the price it can't be beat. It teaches you everything you need to know about the language and the exercises help the knowledge sink in.

The speakers speak slowly and clearly -- not to be taken for granted. The sequence of instruction (a little new vocabulary, new grammar, new dialog) is very good and very well integrated with the book, which adds much depth to the learning, so it retains better.

This goes definitely beyond he travel phrase learning realm, though it is also excellent for that purpose. Good foundation for beginning study of Italian, for real.

I was in a hurry (is there any other type of new language learner?) to learn as much as I could and this book with CD does the trick. It was essential to have the CD so I could listen in the car while on the way to class!

Listening to this tape I get the distinct impression the vocalists enjoy listening to their own Itialian. It leaves very little time for a new speaker to absorb the auditory sounds and repeat. It assumes one has had Italian lessons before and knows more than the basics.
This is a more advanced audio tape than beginners. Needs simplifying.

I was able to communicate and, most importantly, understand the Italian I heard in Firenze and Napoli (slightly different accents). Teach Yourself was an excellent help. I listened to it during my 20 minute commute to and from work for about two months.
It is very important to listen until you can repeat the phrases or responses as if they are second nature.
There are many reviews about how language courses appear before the trip, I can assure you after using the knowledge during my recent trip that this is an excellent course!