Hear hear, it took me 3 years to come back to my Italian blog! I can't believe it. I have been so very busy, as usual. I passed my licensure exam and after a year of probation full of observations, training courses, and teaching portfolio creation stuff, I am now (well since 2021) a tenured teacher of Italian Literature and History! 

I have been teaching an afternoon course of Italian to foreigners and I loved it! I will share my material in the blog asap. If you can please buy a DIZIONARIO VISUALE: it will help you SOOO MUCH with learning new words! 

In the meantime I leave you with a list of books by contemporary Italian writers: read in Italian as much as possible! Not many teacher will admit that, but I think you should buy the English translation of the novel you are reading, if you can find it, to keep it close while you read the original Italian version of the book. It helped me tremendously as a student while I was preparing my English literature exams.

Here is the list:

https://www.mondadoristore.it/scrittori-italiani-contemporanei-libri-migliori/

The list is long but I would suggest starting with a little treasure: LE OTTO MONTAGNE by Cognetti and then watch the marvelous cinematic adaptation. 

BUON LAVORO/DIVERTIMENTO!

Resilienza...

 Che anno il 2021! forse ancora piu' complicato del 2020. Cio' che non cambia e' il nostro amore per la lingua italiana. Leggete questo blog della TRECCANI in cui si parla delle parole nuove della politica. Enjoy the reading!

https://www.treccani.it/magazine/lingua_italiana/

HAPPY NEW YEAR...with a touch of EUFORIA

Carissimi, 

please watch EUFORIA (2018) by Valeria Golino: she is both a beautiful actress and a great film director. Well, she is also an Italian woman...very proud of her!

I wish you a great 2021, everybody! I know this is a tough time...life is striking hard, many people have suffered and are still suffering the consequences of inadeguate ways to manage this emergency, unfortunately. But we must remain positive for our children. That is, maybe, the toughest part of the game. 

Cinema is always making our life more complete and more bearable. It is never wasted time.

I am teaching Italian literature and history, now. I had to put my French aside for a little, but I love my topics so much! After teaching Italian L2, French and English for 20 years, now I am up to my neck in the many adventures of Cesare, Napoleone, Giolitti, Churchill and so on. I am sooooo excited about teaching content and not the language, for a change! I am also completing my certificate in CLIL, so that I can teach History in English in public schools...so delighted about it! 

This summer an essay I wrote with a colleague about Ettore Scola came out and I was so happy about it, I love Scola, as you know from my twin blog on Italian cinema.

So many beautiful things are happening even in the middle of this storm. I pray that it passes soon and we will walk together in the streets without restrictions and fears of being fined just because we are wandering on our dear planet!

BUON ANNO A TUTTI!

Valerio Mastandrea sempre più bravo

Watch THE PLACE (2017) and you'll understand what I mean...

The Place su IMDB

Che tipo di felicità cerchi?

Everything's gonna be alright

"Everything gonna be alright"...quote from Dante or...Bob Marley?

Ciao a tutti, since my last post in January so many things have changed, and you know why, I don't need to explain it... Well, good news: I am still here, bad news: the world is shattered by so many losses that the pain is so hard to send away, and we will feel this pain for years or decades, even after it is all "resolved".

So who cares about getting or not a scholarship, postponing a trip, renouncing to a position... Life made it clear: what to care about is life itself, here and now, that means: your loved ones, your country, your planet, this spheric shaped place we call home. And all the people who inhabit it and make it special (almost always).

Well, I am still teaching French, but from home, and to the best students ever. I am still busy studying, but I am not leaving in the Fall for the US. My daughter is going to Canada in January and I'd love to go and see her next year. Last time I went there was...1997, so many years ago. I still cherish in my heart the memories of Niagara Falls and Toronto.
I was invited in France to a conference, but then of course it was cancelled. I applied for a conference in Ireland, but then it was postponed. I am learning Irish, though, and trying to understand Old English. I am reading Icelandic sagas and Medieval French literature. I am reviewing a journal issue on Italian literature and labour. In the meantime, if your level of Italian is intermediate/advanced, you can read this very informative article I found on the internet:

Lavoro e Letteratura

Snow, chickens, fate, and...windows

Hello everybody,
I can't believe last time I posted was about 9 months ago! God, I have been busy! I have been teaching and studying like crazy. Besides, I'm publishing an essay, I am coediting a book, and I am writing a review for a scholarly publication.
Since September 2019 I've been teaching French. I decided to leave my Italian teaching aside for a little and focus on my French and see if this helps with my licensure exam. Nonetheless, I am still in touch with my colleagues of Italian L2 and we share ideas over lunch break.
Every morning I see a wonderful landscape from my new school windows. The place is a little cold because there are so many windows (I suspect the architect loved glass but didn't have a clue about energy saving measures when it comes to heating a huge building...), working with the right people warms your heart, though!
I am still planning to spend some time in the US, next year, if I get a scholarship I applied for. The competition is tough, so I'm not counting my chickens, right now. At this point I'll let the fate decide.
In the meantime I share with you a picture I took from one of those ...famous windows. 

See the snowy peak in the background...and feel the cold!:-)

What a wonderful year spent teaching Italian L2 and learning!

Hello friends! Ciao amici!

I have been teaching Italian to foreigners in Italian public school since last September, (still one month  and a week left till the end of the school year!).
I was supposed to go back to Florida to teach French, and was already working on my syllabi, but some last minute decisions made me stay. While I miss the US very much, I must say this year has been immensely interesting: I learned so much about teaching Italian at different levels of schools, to students with different backgrounds (South America, Asia, Africa), while taking college level exams on special education, anthropology and pedagogy! I am working on my licensure exam here in Italy, but still harboring my American dream deep inside 😎😊 In fact I visited Washington DC and loved it!

Washington D.C., MLK Junior Memorial.
I took this picture with my phone on an awesome morning in March 2019.