Talk:Italian

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Hey. I don't actually speak much (really any) Italian but at the moment for a major Romance language the Italian Wikibook looks rather like the odd one out amongst the language books, so if anyone is still working on this book, would you mind if I changed the look of the book so we can get some more similiarities between books? (still using the content that you guys have already created, which is great). THis doesn't mean Italian Wikibook has to use the exact same layout as German, French, Spanish etc...(which are all different anyway) because it all depends on content - but breaking up the text into subpages would probably help. Cheers - Serge 09:01, July 26, 2005 (UTC)

I loved the first half of what's available of the book and it helped me a lot, but after that it seems to be still more or less devoid of real teaching content. I don't want to sound pedantic about this and I appreciate a lot what's already there and written, because it's very good and helpful, but I also know that there are loads of things you can forget writing these kinds of texts and details you have to include for foreign speakers etc. etc., so here's a small list of wishes and improvements:

• generally include translations for every word not translated in a text before. This is especially true for the "irregular verbs" section which is without any, at the moment, and thus useless for a learner. Learning translations gradually while reading and applying is much easier than hammering them in later with vocabulary lists, so this is quite important.
• properly describe the composite construction of verbs. The current instruction saying "Using with have and is will put into past tense" is far, far from enough, seeing as those auxiliary verbs have their own declinations and can't be applied at all without knowledge of which tempi the two verbs would be in for a composite case.
• include a description and or sub-chapter about the use of the Congiuntivo in Italian - this form sees many uses across languages and can't really be used or understood without
• sections on indefinite articles, question words
• extend the vocabulary section with:
  • a slightly more detailed section on counting
  • many common phrases and questions, like "Where can I find a youth hostel?", "How much is that?", "Ok/Understood", "Is that correct?" "...
  • many basic verbs, like go, find, like, search, see, learn...
  • times, dates, seasons
• include the basics about further grammar details that would come confusing if seen on a trip, like comparative/augmentative/pejorative forms of adjectives

Surely you can always find more work and refinement to do, but this is what sprung to my mind when I read this book and later switched to another, more detailed resource. Kohlenfresser 08:58, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Exactly

Good points have been brought up, but it seems no one with a good understanding of Italian has stepped up to start improving this book, so I'll start work on that now, starting with the sadly lacking verb section, and then moving on to the rest of the grammar section. Eventually, we can maybe add lessons.