City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books

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.Italian: Beginner's CD Language Course (Hugo in Three Months CD Language Course)
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Milena Reynolds

July 03, 2003
This title passes as 'OK'. It does teach some practical situations that can be missing from the somewhat grammar based 'in three months' courses, but there are several disadvantages to this course:
1) Vocab is given in lists at the end of each chapter rather than 'as you meet it' like in most courses and other 'three months' books.
2) Grammar is introduced in a rather odd way, esp. verb tenses. The conditional, which is often at the end of most beginners' courses, is the third one up after only the present and the perfect etc.
3) There are so many tenses packed into the later chapters that you feel dizzy with them all.
4) Other 'three months' books split the material into 12 or 13 chapters so you can do one per week over ... Read More:
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Used Price: £9.99

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.Italian Berlitz Phrase Book (Berlitz Phrase Books) (Berlitz Phrase Book)
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Berlitz

August 15, 2007
This title passes as 'OK'. It does teach some practical situations that can be missing from the somewhat grammar based 'in three months' courses, but there are several disadvantages to this course:
1) Vocab is given in lists at the end of each chapter rather than 'as you meet it' like in most courses and other 'three months' books.
2) Grammar is introduced in a rather odd way, esp. verb tenses. The conditional, which is often at the end of most beginners' courses, is the third one up after only the present and the perfect etc.
3) There are so many tenses packed into the later chapters that you feel dizzy with them all.
4) Other 'three months' books split the material into 12 or 13 chapters so you can do one per week over ... Read More:
>>See More Reviews & Details on Italian Berlitz Phrase Book (Berlitz Phrase Books) (Berlitz Phrase Book)

Used Price: £1.41

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.Italianissimo: Beginners No.1
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Denise De Rome

October 29, 1992
This collection is more like a fictional narrative in english rather than actually teaching and learning italian. You barely get a chance. The Italian bits go by so fast, and then they are back to a silly collection of totally unnneccessary sound effects, silly music, and far too much english blabbering in between the italian. basically, she rambles on far too much and loads it up with flouncey themes. On top of that, her voice - reminiscent of a puppy dog with a wet nose, you wish she'd do a section on clearing out nasal passages before recording cd's.

The problem with this collection is that it just rambles off some remote italian phrases, but you get absolutely no understanding of how things are put together structurally, thus if you dont have an ... Read More:
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Used Price: £0.01

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.Contatti 1: A First Course in Italian: CD Pack: Transcript Pack
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Mariolina Freeth, Giuliana Checketts

June 25, 2004
I bought the CD as part of the Contatti Italian to teach a class. I speak Italian fluently, and even then found the layout confusing. The CD is not divided into the various sub-sections so one cannot FF or RW except between chapters and one therefore wastes much time waiting for the right sub-section to be played. I would therefore NOT recommend it to anyone unless the CD is remastered to allow stop/start in between each sub-section.
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Used Price: £17.83

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.Complete Italian Grammar Review (Barron's Foreign Language Guides)
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: M. Danesi

September 29, 2006
This is truly the best grammar book I have found for Italian, truly a great piece of work by the author. It explains everything that "a Reference Grammar of Modern Italian" does, only in a way that everyone can understand, and without all the extensive technical information. Italian examples are in green writing so that you can easily distinguish different parts of explanations. On my first read I have already absorbed more that I did with "a Reference Grammar of Modern Italian". This is not say "a Reference Grammar of Modern Italian" is rubbish, it is not, it is a really in depth study of Italian grammar, but I personally prefer a book that I can understand, and I honestly believe that everyone can understand the content from the barrons book.
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Used Price: £7.98

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.Contatti 2: An Intermediate Course in Italian: Student Book
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Giuliana Checketts, Mariolina Freeth

June 30, 2006
has a lot of work for groups or writing, so no good for self-study. SO many mistakes its unbelieveable (e.g. missing CD tracks, missing answers, extra answers to questions which dont exist, spelling errors just to name a few).

This pack comes with CD, course book and answer key with tapescript. you have to buy the Activity book with all the grammar work seperately. This activity book, saves my rating from being a 1 star. it is a good book with lots of practice. the course book is rubbish. even the feel is out of date. it says it is the 2nd edition published in 2006, but the photos look like they come from the 80's and the layout is not very pretty. certainly not wotrth the money, but good luck if you can find another intermediate course!! also ... Read More:
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Used Price: £8.49

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.Linguaphone All Talk Italian: 4 Hour Course
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
from: Linguaphone

2003-02
has a lot of work for groups or writing, so no good for self-study. SO many mistakes its unbelieveable (e.g. missing CD tracks, missing answers, extra answers to questions which dont exist, spelling errors just to name a few).

This pack comes with CD, course book and answer key with tapescript. you have to buy the Activity book with all the grammar work seperately. This activity book, saves my rating from being a 1 star. it is a good book with lots of practice. the course book is rubbish. even the feel is out of date. it says it is the 2nd edition published in 2006, but the photos look like they come from the 80's and the layout is not very pretty. certainly not wotrth the money, but good luck if you can find another intermediate course!! also ... Read More:
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Used Price: £19.95

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.Italian Berlitz Intermediate
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
from: Berlitz Publishing

April 21, 2008
has a lot of work for groups or writing, so no good for self-study. SO many mistakes its unbelieveable (e.g. missing CD tracks, missing answers, extra answers to questions which dont exist, spelling errors just to name a few).

This pack comes with CD, course book and answer key with tapescript. you have to buy the Activity book with all the grammar work seperately. This activity book, saves my rating from being a 1 star. it is a good book with lots of practice. the course book is rubbish. even the feel is out of date. it says it is the 2nd edition published in 2006, but the photos look like they come from the 80's and the layout is not very pretty. certainly not wotrth the money, but good luck if you can find another intermediate course!! also ... Read More:
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Used Price: £12.16

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.Teach Yourself Italian Book/CD Pack (Teach Yourself Languages)
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Lydia Vellaccio, Maurice Elston

March 01, 2003
This is an excellent little book, as long as you use the CD with it. I didn't give it five stars because I feel that in some areas the authors were trying to get too much grammar in than can be absorbed all at once , and I think a few solid written texts ( short adapted and graded extracts from newspapers or letter, articles etc) would've helped rather than just short dialogues. Nevertheless, I've learnt quite a bit and think that by the time I visit Italy I'll be able to get by without getting lost or arrested!
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Used Price: £16.98

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.Italianissimo: Intermediate Course Book Bk. 2 (Italianissimo)
City Travel Guides > Books > Phrase Books
by: Denise De Rome

January 28, 1994
Italian is not my first foreign language I have ever learnt. And I don't really understand why people would turn this course down. I have seen quite a few language materials available here on Amazon. There are two types of them: 1) "super-modern" solutions (Michel Thomas, Learn Italian in your car) or "modest-size" materials (phrase books, short self study courses -e.g. "Teach yourself Italian") - these are, probably, make good choice for beginners or one-time travellers to Italy;

2) "traditional" courses - some of them are obsolete and boring but not all of them.
Whilst mentioned materials from the first type can make you progress in relatively little time, give self-confidence or only satisfy your needs occasionally, only "traditional" courses can really ... Read More:
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Used Price: £24.86