Saturday, July 25, 2009

Get Fluent In Italian In 3 Months With This Plan

By Robertson B. Kunz

If you are interested in learning Italian, you probably want to learn it as quickly and efficiently as possible. In this article I want to explore the option of gaining basic fluency in Italian in 3 months or less.

In reality, many Italian students end up learning Italian for years in Italian language classes only to find that they still can't carry on a basic conversation by the end of their studies. On the other hand, I personally know many people who have learned Italian or another foreign language in 3 months or less.

Before I get more into the plan, I should note that those of you who already know another romance language like Spanish or French will find this much easier to do. Also, if you have studied a foreign language that wasn't necessarily a romance one, you will still have a slight advantage. For those of you who have never studied a foreign language before, you may find that the process takes you a bit more time because you are not used to learning foreign languages yet.

However, you should know that it is definitely possible to achieve basic fluency in Italian in 3 months as long as you stay committed to studying Italian each and every day for a serious amount of time.

Let's go over some basic numbers so that you can see for yourself what is required to get to the basic fluency level in Italian.

In European languages, the 1000 most commonly used words make up 85% of common speech. The 3000 most commonly used words make up 95% of common speech. In order to achieve basic fluency in Italian, we need to hit the 95% mark which means a total of 3000 words.

Also, many language experts tell us that in order for an English speaker to learn a European language like Italian, Spanish or French, it requires about 200 hours of active study time.

So, because you are going to study for 3 months, you will have 90 days of study. This means learning about 33 new Italian words per day. If you devote 2 hours to this study process, you will get 180 hours of study in by the end of 3 months which is basically the 200 hours recommended by language experts.

You might think that learning 33 new Italian words per day is too hard. But consider the fact that you are going to be studying 2 hours everyday. This means you learn 16 words per hour or about 1 word every 4 minutes.

Take into consideration the fact that many cognates exist between Italian and English like the English word "international" being "internazionale" in Italian and you will see that you will be able to pick up many Italian words in less than 5 seconds.

However, we should remember that you won't have all 2 hours to devote entirely to the study of new words. Remember that you will want to review words that you have learned in the past and also make sure you are picking up important things like correct grammar. After all this, however, you should still have enough time to reach your goal of basic Italian fluency.

Given this goal of 2 hours of active study each day and a goal of learning 3000 words by the end of your study period, you will achieve basic fluency in Italian in 3 months. The important thing is that you stay committed to studying each and every day and make sure that you are continually progressing. If you stay true to your plan, you will achieve your Italian fluency goal.

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