ITAL10001: Italian 3

Under university protocol the assessment needs to be unique for each subject code, even if the subjects themselves are essentially the same. You will notice that the only difference in assessment is that second year students also need to fill out an online reflective diary over the course of the semester.
ITAL10001

• Three take home assignments (250 words each) in weeks 4, 8 and 11

Since there are no Italian reviews on this forum, I'm going to do my best to be as detailed and comprehensive as possible, not only about this subject but also from what I have gathered from Italian 1-4 as a whole. It seems that they read a lot like T. Rav's Spanish 1-4 reviews (which is a good thing). I'll see if I can get Edward21 to write about his experiences in Italian 5 and what Italian 5-10 is like (although from what I've heard it was also like T. Rav's experience with Spanish 5 - not a good thing ).

Anyway, this was definitely my favourite subject this semester. I absolutely loved taking it and I recommend beginner/intermediate Italian to everyone. The staff are outstanding, the assessment structure is light and accessible and it is very user-friendly as a breadth subject. If you're looking for a subject that's both incredibly useful and easy to get an H1 in (and there aren't too many that fit both of these categories), then Italian 1-4 is for you.

So Italian 3 is obviously a bit of an awkward entry point for a first year student but it had to be my entry point since I studied Italian up until the end of Year 11 at school. Italian 1 is designed for students with no prior experience studying Italian (or they studied it until the end of Year 9 at the latest), while Italian 5 is the main entry point for students who have completed Italian in Year 12. Hence, I fitted exactly in the middle and Italian 3 was where I belonged. Most of the cohort as a result consists of second year students (yes, just because there's two subject codes doesn't mean they're run independently) but I really didn't mind. They were all pretty nice and welcoming to me so in the end it didn't phase me at all. Italian 3 is a bit of a mixed bag actually when it comes to the student build-up: there's second year students who did Italian 1 and Italian 2 in first year, there's first year students like myself who have some prior experience learning Italian but do not have sufficient knowledge to cope with Italian 5 (for example one girl had never studied the language at school before but went on exchange to Italy for two years), there's Arts students who intend to major or minor in the subject, there's students from basically every other degree taking the subject as breadth, there's students taking the subject as part of the Diploma of Languages and there's even a few mature-aged entry students!

As a result, you have people of all sorts of abilities and with varying strengths and weaknesses in the subject. The staff are aware of this and so the course structure often involves people bouncing things off each other and learning in a holistic manner like that. One of my only negatives with this subject is when someone who's particularly strong in Italian takes over a little bit too much and hogs discussion, somewhat discouraging less confident members of the class from contributing. Although, the staff do try their best to make sure that everyone gets a turn and that no one is left out. A placement test has been devised for determining language entry points but it isn't foolproof and I think there may have been a couple of members of my class who should have enrolled in either higher or lower levels (mainly higher levels though). This is another small negative I have, only because those individuals are not only clearly playing the system but ruin the experience for the rest of us a little bit. Ultimately this isn't the fault of the staff but rather due to selfish students. To anyone reading this contemplating enrolling in Italian 3 knowing they belong in a higher level (because they know they won't be able to get away with Italian 1), if the consequence of having your enrolment cancelled isn't enough, I challenge you to be honest and do what's right, not just for yourself but for everyone else. However, I do want to emphasise that this wasn't a major issue, so don't let this deter you from taking the subject.

Anyway, onwards with the review. To give you an idea of what you cover in Italian 3 and whether it is the right level for you, here is a list of the major grammar points we learnt:

• Revision of the presente indicativo (present tense)
• Revision of the imperfetto (imperfect tense)
• Revision of the passato prossimo (present perfect tense)
• Distinguishing when to use the imperfetto or passato prossimo
• Interrogativi (interrogative questions)
• Pronomi personali di oggetto diretto (direct object pronouns)
• Negativi (negative phrases)
• Pronomi personali di oggetto indiretto (indirect object pronouns)
• The verb piacere (to like or to be pleasing to)
• Verbi riflessivi e reciproci (reflexive and reciprocal verbs)
• Futuro (the futuro semplice - simple future - and futuro anteriore - anterior future - tenses)
• Condizionale (the condizionale presente - present conditional - and condizionale passato - past conditional - tenses)
• The modal verbs potere (to be able to), dovere (to have to) and volere (to want)
• Congiuntivo (the congiuntivo presente - present subjunctive - and congiuntivo passato - past subjunctive - tenses)

This is roughly the grammar points that you normally cover in Year 10 and Year 11 Italian (Italian 1-2 at university covers Year 7, Year 8 and Year 9 Italian). In addition to this list you will be expected to learn smaller grammar points in your own time using the Da Capo textbook. You will find that you've probably come into contact with most of these smaller points before, hence why they are not given any direct attention in class or in the assessments (that being said all grammar points will play their part in the assessment tasks anyway). Personally, I had come into contact with most of these before but having had a whole year without studying Italian, I felt as if I was learning some of these for the first time. It's amazing just how more intricately you will explore even some of the more simple grammar points at university. It helped me a lot in improving my language. Provided that nothing there is unfamiliar or that you know absolutely everything on that list, then Italian 3 is the right entry point for you.

I must admit that it took me quite a while to get used to this subject and initially I was afraid that I had made the wrong choice. Many of the second year students looked the same as well. One major change from previous Italian study is that conversation in English is kept to a minimum - whether it is the teacher explaining a concept or giving out an instruction or a student needing to ask a question about a topic (or even just a general request like going to the toilet), the language used is Italian. This sounds logical but it threw me at first because speaking and listening are my worst skills. Fortunately I gained a lot from being thrown in the "deep" end and I'm thankful for it, as are most of the other members of my class. Give this subject until the census date and I'm sure that you will probably have changed your mind about it, for the better.

In a sense, perhaps one of the reasons why I enjoyed this subject so much was that it wasn't that different from a normal high school class, with the exception of all the bullshit that normally plagues LOTE classes. In your two hour language classes, you will primary use your subject reader to complete various activities and learn more about life in Italy. You may read excerpts from texts and even watch a film - it will all be in Italian but if you don't understand anything at any point do not hesitate to ask and the teacher will be more than happy to explain it to you in English (this goes for everything actually). This is important because these texts come up in the assessments, so you need to understand them. Even if you feel uncomfortable, don't be afraid to speak up - it's not worth suffering later in what should be a fairly straightforward assessment. In the one hour grammar class, the teacher mainly provides a short slideshow on a grammar point and asks you to complete some activities from Da Capo either in class or for homework. I personally liked the textbook because it explained the grammar in black and white and is devoid of all the crap that high school LOTE textbooks are usually full of but perhaps it wasn't as user-friendly for the more creatively-minded students. It's an American textbook so sometimes it will say something confusing like "in Italy they write the date differently" (it's the same format as here, but in the US they have a different system) which can sometimes throw you at first, but overall I thought it was pretty effective.

My highlight of every week was the conversation class. The philosophy of the Italian staff is that speaking and listening assessments are counter-intuitive to the development of those skills, as they put you under pressure and make you nervous. Instead, they want to nurture those skills in a more relaxed environment without assessment. As speaking and listening skills were the two very things I needed to work on the most, I found this system did wonders for me. Not to mention that they were always just genuinely incredibly fun classes. You will be given some sort of stimulus (perhaps an activity, a song, a small clip etc.) and you basically just spend the hour talking to the people on your table in Italian. I don't think it gets more relaxing than that at university. Unfortunately, the negative I have here is that sometimes we just weren't given enough time to talk to each other. Sometimes technology would fail us (not the fault of the department) but sometimes they would try to shove in too many activities in that hour and by the time we got through the stimulus material we would only have 10-15 minutes discussion time. I hope they try to pack in less activities in the future, or perhaps consider extending the duration of the conversation class to 90 minutes. The only assessment relating to this class is attendance - you need to attend at least 75% of the classes and actively participate in them to get awarded 10% to your grade. You don't even need to be perfect in your participation to get the 10% - as long as you have a go, it's OK. I know some people don't like being marked on participation but if you're studying a language (and are serious about it), particularly at beginner or intermediate level, you need to get as much practice in as possible. This is essentially free marks awarded to you for developing your own skills. Definitely nothing to scoff at.

In my opinion the other assessments for this subject were all very fair, not over-demanding and easy to score well in. There are three take-home assignments to be completed over the course of the semester, totalling 30% of your grade. They will relate to the topics and grammar points you have been covering in your language and grammar classes and are never more than about 300 words in length. They would take me a couple of hours to do only because I wanted to do them as accurately as possible - in the mid-semester test and exam I was expected to write responses of similar length in about half an hour, which I still found quite manageable, so you could theoretically pump them out in a lot less time with no issues. In addition you will also sit a 90 minute mid-semester test worth 20% of your grade the week before the mid-semester break, covering all the language topics and grammar points covered thus far. Initially I was really nervous about this test (most of the mid-semester tests I had to sit for other subjects were worth very little in comparison) but in the end most of us found it to be quite accessible. Most of us also completely overestimated the time constraint on it - I finished it half way and most members of the class left quite early that day. You won't be permitted a dictionary but the language is purposefully kept on the simple side so you should not have any issues in that regard. The mid-semester test has a vocabulary section (15 marks where you write 50-60 words about a provided image), a comprehension section (20 marks where you answer in Italian - you never answer anything in English in this subject - some questions relating to a given passage), a grammar section (35 marks) and an essay section (30 marks where you write a 150-200 word passage in response to one of several possible topics). You will be provided with a mock mid-semester test to help you along, which is very similar in structure to the actual mid-semester test. Just remember to take your time - you'll have plenty of it - and you'll manage just fine. The vast majority of the class (even the weaker students who are relying on translators to get by) manage to get a H1 for all the assessments, which is quite a shock when you see all the corrections that have been made. Perhaps they're very lenient markers. It explains why Italian has been so popular as a breadth subject with so many people in the past, even if people are not really that good at it.

The two hour exam is worth 40% of your overall mark and is exactly the same format as the mid-semester test. Despite the extra half hour, it isn't any longer than the mid-semester test, and does not assess anything that the mid-semester test already covered. This made things a breeze when it came to revision since I only had to go over five weeks of content. In addition, I knew that I could go super slow and still finish it on time. Some people walked out in as little as 30 minutes - I finished about half an hour early this time and made sure I checked over everything for the remaining time as usual. Again, there's no dictionary allowed but you shouldn't have any trouble with the vocabulary.

My teacher for the semester was Elisabetta Ferrari, who was nothing short of amazing. I've heard great things about all the other Italian staff as well, although it seems the general consensus that Elisabetta is the best teacher and the most reasonable marker. She was born in Italy and Italian is her first language so ultimately I felt we were getting the real deal in terms of language use while we were in her classes. In fact, she was so popular that she has decided to take on all Italian 4 classes next semester! I absolutely cannot wait. Agnese Bresin took all conversation classes and was also outstanding. Again, she is born in Italy and helped us to develop really genuine language skills, albeit in a really fun and engaging way. She's returning to Italy next semester so a new conversation class teacher will be taking over.
So if you cannot already tell, I absolutely loved this subject and I'm so keen for everyone else to experience it. Never before have I felt so passionate studying Italian and I can't wait to get back into it next semester. That's all I can think of for now, but I really hope I've given you an insight into this great subject. If you have any questions regarding Italian at all, please do not hesitate to ask me. In bocca al lupo! (Good luck! )

No, as there are no lectures in the subject. Grammar slides will be made available on the LMS after each grammar class.

As I said, there are no lectures in this subject but the following staff members take one language group* each:

• Prof John Hajek
• Elisabetta Ferrari
• Renata Berto

* Note: The two seminar classes are streamed together. When preparing a timetable, make sure you look at the repeats - if the repeat number is the same, the classes are linked. Conversation classes are not linked.

Conversation class teacher:

• Agnese Bresin

No.

4.5/5

• Da Capo, 7th Edition. Antonio Morena and Donatella Melucci, Annamaria Moneti and Graziana Lazzarini 2011
• Da Capo, student activities manual. Silvia Abbiati and Julia Cozzarelli 2011
• Collins Italian Dictionary & Grammar

You will also need to purchase a subject reader which will be used throughout the semester.

The textbook is absolutely essential as you will be working through it over the course of the semester. The student activities manual is not necessary, but you have to buy the textbook and the workbook together so you'll end up buying that too. The student activities manual is not used in class but can be used as revision. Given the lack of revision material for this subject, I'd recommend using this book over the course of the semester anyway.

Obviously you don't necessarily have to have the Collins bilingual dictionary - any will suffice. I use the Garzanti bilingual dictionary, recommended by my teachers at high school since the Italians tend to do a better job at translating English than we do translating Italian . It's a really expensive dictionary but since I've used it a lot over an extended period of time, I've got my use out of it. While it's an amazing dictionary, it's probably not worth it if you're studying Italian only in the short term. You're not allowed to use a dictionary in the mid-semester test or the exam, only the take-home assignments. The use of an online translator is strictly prohibited and may result in the cancellation of your enrolment at the university.

Contact Hours: 4 hours. 1 x 2-hour seminar and 1 x 1-hour seminar per week. 1 x 1-hour tutorial per week.
- The two hour seminar is your language class, with a focus on reading and writing about a particular topic or theme. The one hour seminar is your grammar class, focussing solely on learning and consolidating grammar points. The tutorial is your conversation class, obviously focussing on developing your speaking and listening skills.
Total Time Commitment: 8 hours per week, including 4 hours of class time. Total 96 hours.

H1