Giada Bassoli

Hi! I am Giada and I teach all levels of Italian from beginners to advanced, starting from grammar and vocabulary up until literature. My lessons are therefore geared towards students studying Italian at any level, and who are either struggling with the language at school/university or willing to learn it privately. However, students are required to have specific goals in mind so that teaching is personalised and directed towards what they want to achieve.

The first part of the lesson is usually dedicated to teaching involving direct engagement and participation from the student. While this changes according to the goals and level of the student, my lessons generally include the development and mastering of five main language skills:

- grammar: including explanations of rules exercises (and sometimes videos);
- vocabulary: almost every lesson students will advance in their vocabulary (specific requests can be made, e.g. students in the past have asked me to learn specific vocabularies related to their work field / passion or to prepare them with the essential vocabulary to study / work in Italy!);
- reading: including accent reduction, comprehension and translation exercises;
- listening: including dialogues and dictation exercises;
- speaking: involving direct conversations with me to practise grammar / vocabulary and fluency.

I use and combine various grammar books and texts that my students have found helpful in the past, as well as past papers from international Italian qualifications for listening and reading exercises.

Toward the end of the lesson, there will be time for questions of any kind and the student will be assigned homework or readings to be completed for the next lesson.

For those who are learning Italian on their own, I plan a schedule for the specific goals you want to achieve and usually assign homework (exercises, videos, talks or readings) every week. I generally set a test every 10-15 lessons, as all of my students find this very helpful for revision and to track their improvement with the language. However, this is just to be taken as an opportunity to study and can be avoided if the student decides that it is not necessary.

For those learning Italian at school/uni or willing to achieve a specific qualification, I assign work and plan my lectures according to the guidelines of the exam to be taken.

As a final note, while I am based in London and work with many students who speak English as their first language, I also work and have worked with various international students and have found that different linguistic backgrounds do not limit, but rather can even help with the learning of Italian - so do not worry at all if English is your second language and you are learning Italian as your third or fourth language, you will definitely do great!

Finally, I have extended experience with online teaching, as I have mostly been teaching online for the past year and I am still teaching online now. I usually prefer Meets and Teams for online teaching, but Zoom and other apps work too!

Regarding my availability, I am currently a university student so, beside a few mandatory contact hours a week, I am very adaptable to the student's needs. I am also available in the evenings and during the weekend.