Learning to speak Italian

Hi Rick,

Everyone seems to like Rosetta Stone, but I found something for a lot less money and very easy to learn. I recently studied the Italian language at Grand Valley University. My professor had me purchase Living Language Ultimate Italian, beginner-intermediate. We studied from this book and it also comes with CD's. There are two sets of CD's, one for home use that you use as you follow the book, and the other to listen to while you drive, or you can download it to your iPod. This is one of the best courses I have ever taken and I owe it all to the ease of the Ultimate Italian book and CD's. The cost under $100.00 at Barnes and Noble. Good luck.

Greg

Thanks Greg! I didn't want to spend the money on Rosetta Stone since we only have a month before we go to Italy...

Another resource is the BBC website, which has free language courses in Italian,German,French,Spanish and a host of others. You listen to conversation snippets and indicate what you did and didnt understand. It is very good and FREE

Rick,
Where will you be going in Italy? We went to Rome, Venice, and Verona and really didn't need to know Italian. But we'd try the basics and always remember to ask for the check in Italian. At first we were rather apprehensive as you don't want to sound the fool. But in these more touristy of areas, you're fine with most of the basics.

I've been using Pimsleur Italian I/II/III to try and learn the language, and so far it's been working well. I decided to use "Bookchips" rather than CD's, as these operate in my Palm PDA (which I usually have with me).

I've looked at Rosetta Stone and it looks good, but being PC based is a problem for me. I find it easier having something I can use anywhere without a PC.

Regarding the previous post stating that one can "get by" without Italian in Rome, Venice, etc., my experience has been that it's extremely helpful to have at least basic Italian skills. That helped me on numerous occasions. While it's true that one can "get by" in the larger cities, in many smaller locations a tourist is less likely to find someone that speaks English.

Happy travels!

I agree that it's very helpful to become familiar with Italian before you go over there. You may not have many opportunities to speak it, but it will help you read things, especially signs. There are certain "conversion" tricks to turning many Italian words into a close English equivalent, and learning a little of the language will help with that.

I guess I didn't quite clarify my 'get by' comment. I had taken Italian in college some 20 years ago, so I really didn't retain much other than pronunciation. This become noticeable while my wife, who has had some Spanish, and I practiced beforehand.
But most everything I actually used for speaking could be found in Rick's book or from lots of free online podcasts, etc... Hello, please, how are you, I would like, red wine of the house, etc...
Even though I knew servers, etc... knew I was American, I felt obligated to try in Italian. That was fine until they would respond to me in Italian. My ability to say things and sometimes read things was fine. But my ability to comprehend Italian spoken to me wasn't good. I'd go deer in headlights.
The important thing is to understand that you'll be fine and not let inability to speak Italian keep you from having a fantastic time!

Try LearnItalianpod.com. Both free and by subscription. Good luck.

Thanks to all who responded! We are going to Rome and staying at the Mecenate for 5 days and then on to Florence at a countryside Villa. I have received phone calls from both hotels and they spoke very good English... but we would like to at least know some of the polite responses... thanks for the suggestions

Don't bother with a CD. If you have a computr or better yet, an iPod, try either learnitalianpod.com or mydailyphrase.com. Both are free. As a former foreign language teacher I found mydailyphrase.com/italian to be better of the two. Both allow extra content for subscription but given your near departure date I wouldn't bother with that. Both offer short dialogues dealing with commonly encountered situations. After studying for 6 months before travelling I found my Italian good enough for what I needed and actually too good in some intances, as it elicited a torrent of italian that was obviously way beyond my ability. Good luck!

I also used the Pimsleur method and the benefit of it was hearing the language spoken. I used the CDs while walking/exercising/driving, and was able to ask for directions and actually understand the spoken language.I took seven years of Spanish in school, and now I actually understand the spoken Italian better than the spoken Spanish