BBC Languages

If you’re not already familiar with it, the BBC Languages web site is good online tool for language study and practice. It has many good resources to aid you along the way, and they’re available for several languages.

Here are some of the things you’ll find if you browse the BBC Languages page for Italian:

• Italian Steps – a course for learning basic, conversational (not fluent!) Italian in 12 weeks
• Talk Italian – a series of videos of Italian conversation in common situations. Note: the videos did not work for me in the US, but the transcripts are still useful.
• Italianissimo – Basically, a phrasebook. Apparently based on a show called Italianissimo.
• Quick fix – Essential words and phrases with audio pronunciation
• Cool Italian – Colloquial and slang words and phrases, with audio. I expect that I’ll be spending some time here soon.
• Italian gauge – A quick, 12-question quiz to determine your general skill level in Italian. (I scored a 9. Not bad.)
• TV and radio – Television and radio clips in Italian. These, like the previously mentioned videos, did not play for me.
• Your say – user-submitted tips
• Phrase of the day – Learn a new word or phrase every day. Also available via RSS or Twitter.
• Grammar – Practical, situational grammar tips. Not a collection of boring rules.

There are also resources for teachers and tutors, though that really doesn’t interest me, since I am a language learniner.

I was rather disappointed about the regional restriction on the video conversations and video clips, but there are still plenty of good things to be found on the BBC Languages web site.

I’ve been receiving the word of the day by RSS in my Google Reader since the start, though the RSS feed doesn’t seem to update regularly, so it helps to follow the Twitter feed too.

It’s worth a look to see if there’s something there that’s useful for the language you’re currently studying.