Italian: Level 1-3 (Learn in Your Car)

With this audio set, you just turn it on, listen and repeat.
The nine discs progress through, gradually introducing new
words, verbs, pronouns, nouns, etc incorporating the grammar
rules as you go. It is certainly the most satisfying and fun
way to learn that I have tried. I found it interesting to use
the things was already familiar with, but you could use it
without knowing anything and pick up a good working knowledge
of Italian.

In the set there are included 3 extra discs by the author about how
to approach learning any new language: very useful, although
the audio quality is somewhat " home-made ".

Like the name say's, it's for learning in your car. As explained
in another review, there's English in one ear and Italian in the other.
I found that O.K. I did find that the gaps left for
speaking are pretty short: you really need to think quick.This
may be deliberate, but sometimes I like to pause the player and
think about the answer. I transferred all my discs onto one
to avoid having to change them over.

One serious point: learning in your car can be distracting and
there are some safety implications to this: I’ll say no more.
In summary then, a very good buy for use on its own
or as a supplement to other material.


Creates time to learn   September 6, 2005
20 out of 20 found this review helpful

I would endorse all the comments made by Graham Phillips, who has made a good factual description of the product.

I spent a good deal of time going through all nine CD's and I have now just returned from Italy, having had the first chance to try my skills out. My impressions were as follows:

1. I can think of no other way of learning so much of the language without taking time out to do lessons or study books at home. Those 30-40 minutes a day in the car, every day, would be difficult to find otherwise.
2. You are learning to speak by listening and speaking out-loud, not by reading. This gives extra confidence in speaking. The repetition of listening to a native speaker over and over again gives you a good feel for the sounds of the language.
3. The continual repetition of set sentences forces you to think quickly and clearly, which is good in conversation.
4. Because it is based on repetition, it does not so much equip you for spontaneous expression and conversation. But neither does any other kind of book or CD-Rom.
5. Encourages clear, accurate pronunciation, and accurate grammar.
6. In no way helps writing or spelling. I have still never written a word in Italian. Even though the product comes with booklets, it's far from being a full grammar guide and I must say I barely used the booklets. I did however refer to another book when I was unsure of grammar points - I used Italian in Three Months for this purpose. It covers about the same amount of grammar and vocab.

When I went to Italy and spoke for the first time, everyone could understand clearly straightaway, and was happy to speak back in Italian. I could handle most general situations without difficulty. These CD's allowed to me to get to this level without any study time set aside. All I had to do was to use the CD's to and from work, rather than listening to radio or music.


A few clarifications   April 23, 2005
Graham Phillips (Cambridge, UK)
29 out of 30 found this review helpful

Here are a few extra comments to help avoid misunderstanding.
Grammar. The course does cover Italian grammar. Each lesson (there are over a hundred in all) illustrates one or a few grammatical points. These are (quite sensibly) explained in the accompanying booklets rather than on the CDs. The course does not go into great detail, and you may want to get another grammar book as well.
Vocabulary. Certainly this course emphasises vocabulary. Some other courses cover far fewer words, with the consequence that you can find yourself in Italy confident of your imperfect subjunctives but unable to ask where the bathroom is. Learning vocab is a necessary part of learning a language, and this course makes the process less painful than most.
Context. As the booklet explains, no sentence introduces more than one new word. There are some lessons that just have a list of words, but these are soon built up into meaningful sentences. The first lesson starts with the word "I"; lesson 2 starts with "I want"; lesson 6 has "I would like to make a reservation" and by lesson 30 you have sentences like "he wants a ticket for the train that leaves for Naples at ten o'clock in the morning".
Themes. Each lesson has a title and a theme. Sometimes these are real-life themes, like hotels, shopping or transport, and sometimes they are grammatical themes like prepositional pronouns or the verb "Essere", imperfect tense. Some lessons have "ragbag" themes like "Some important concepts" or "Common expressions".
Repetition. Each word or phrase or sentence is spoken first in English then (after a pause) in Italian and then (after another pause) in Italian again. You have three opportunities to say the Italian. The instructions suggest that you work through the first lesson repeatedly until you know it pretty well, then add the second lesson similarly, then the third, etc, frequently going back to revise earlier lessons. Obviously you can't learn the language simply by playing through the CDs once (if only!).