Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Transcript

Ciao a tutti! Sono Consuelo. Hi, everybody! I’m Consuelo.
Welcome back to ItalianPod101.com’s Italiano in tre minuti, the fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Italian.
In the last lesson, we covered the sentences come si dice in italiano? and cosa significa? Do you remember? These Italian sentences mean "How do you say it in Italian?" and "What does it mean?" respectively. Today, we’re going to learn a new phrase that is very important to help you focus your skills not on the sounds, but on the writing.
Allora cominciamo! So let’s start!
Whenever you’re asking for advice about a good restaurant, a special thing to buy, or a place and you don’t know how it is spelled, what would you say? Può scriverlo per favore? "Can you write it down, please?"
(One more time slowly: può scriverlo per favore?)
Può means "can you" when referring to Lei, sriver-lo is composed of the verb scrivere, to write, plus the pronoun lo, and you already know per favore, "please."
(slide with meaning for each word)
Alternatively, you can also use the expression:
Me lo può scrivere per favore?
(One more time slowly: me lo puòscrivere per favore?)
Which actually means "can you write it down for me, please?"
Now, you don’t know how to pronounce what the person writes for you in Italian? What would you say?
It’s very easy! Let’s see: come si pronuncia? "How do we pronounce it?"
(One more time slowly: come si pronuncia?)
We already covered come si, which means "how do we," and the verb pronuncia comes from pronunciare, "to pronounce."
So you can become more familiar with the Italian alphabet, now I'll tell you how we say each of our letters:
A a, B bi, C ci, D di, E e, F effe, G gi, H acca, I i, L elle, M emme, N enne,O o, P pi, Q cu, R erre, S esse, T ti, U u, V vu, Z zeta
Instead of pronunciare, "to pronounce," we can also ask how to say something by using the verb meaning "to read," which in Italian is leggere.
In this case, the sentence goes like come si legge? "How do we read it?"
(One more time slowly: come si legge?)
Let’s put in practice what we’ve just learned!
Background changes: on the street
Consuelo: Scusi, dove siamo adesso?
Passer-by: In Piazza Ferrucci.
Consuelo: (giving a pen and a piece of paper) Me lo può scrivere per favore?
Passer-by: Certo! Prego!
Consuelo: Ah, e…come si pronuncia?
Passer-by: (breaking down in syllables) PIA-ZZA-FE-RRU-CCI.
Consuelo: Grazie, molto gentile!
Passer-by: Prego, non c’è di che!
Now it’s time for Consuelo’s tips
When in Italy, please remember that normally, most people will always be available and ready to help you, so if you want someone to write something but you don't have anything to write with or you don't have something to write on, don’t be shy. Ask Ha una penna? “Do you have a pen?” or Ha un pezzo di carta? "Do you have a piece of paper?"
This does it for today! In the next lesson, we’ll cover what to say when we're exchanging money.
We’ll be waiting for you in our next Italiano in tre minuti lesson!
Ciao alla prossima lezione!!

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