ITALIAN VOCABULARY CARDS #1

ITALIAN FOR CHILDREN VOCABULARY CARDS BEGINNER ITALIAN VOCABULARY CARDS 99 beginner Italian words & phrases with 99 matching English vocabulary cards really do help to create a lively language learning environment, ideal for advanced beginner Italian learners, and a great revision resource for students entering into intermediate Italian.

Students can develop, embed, reinforce and refresh their beginner Italian vocabulary in a cooperative, communicative and interactive way, independently of the teacher. The game cards and accompanying Recall & Write activities have a bonus multi-skill focus on listening, speaking, pronunciation, reading, writing and spelling. It doesn’t matter if any of the words or phrases don’t feature in your medium or even longer-term learning plan: this is a great way of encouraging your students to engage with new language, and to build their vocabulary at the same time. Giving students regular and frequent opportunities to work with the cards and the written recall challenges is really effective, not only when we're focusing on these particular vocabulary themes, but also across the school year, and even when they're far more advanced in their learning - all learners benefit from going back to the start. My students use their recall workbooks quite a few times, simply covering previous answers. This means that prep and paper are kept to a minimum.

The vocabulary groups are as follows:

* Saluti

* I giorni della settimana

* I mesi dell'anno

* I numeri da 0 a 20

* La mia famiglia

* Le parole comuni

* Italiano in classe

* Domande e risposte

Students can work independently of the teacher, challenging themselves and each other in their best Italian accent to find all the matching words & phrases cards in Italian and English. The card templates allow students to apply their Italian knowledge practically and creatively, as they put together mini-quiz cards for each other, preferably from memory. Creating new language is an essential element of successful language learning, so this is a key part of the overall activity, and it's really popular with my students.

The Reference, Recall & Write book has 18 pages. It includes an alphabetical Italian-English reference list of all 99 words & phrases. Students find this really useful as a learning support resource, and it comes in very handy for quick vocabulary quizzes too. The Recall and Write challenges help students familiarise themselves with, and really embed, the range of vocabulary in the set, and also get used to reading, writing and spelling in Italian. It’s also a great way of developing literacy skills in Italian. There are three recall challenges:

Written Recall Challenge One students write the English word or phrase from an Italian prompt, with all the words and phrases grouped together in the same category

Written Recall Challenge Two with this challenge, students write the words or phrases in Italian from an English prompt, and again, they're all group together in the same category

Written Recall Challenge Three the final challenge ‘switches’ at each question from Italian to English, and lists words and phrases randomly from each category. This challenges the memory more than when the vocabulary is in the order learners first learn it in, with the additional challenge of moving between the two languages - I've found that this really does encourage my students to think hard about their Italian vocabulary.

I encourage students to visit the Ideas, Notes and Next Steps page regularly, reflecting not only on the words and phrases they feel confident about, but also how they think their skills in listening, speaking, pronouncing Italian, reading and writing are developing - and equally importantly, what they can reasonably do to keep improving. We also use their notes to guide and inform whole-group discussion about learning and progress in general, which is really useful, and a very popular activity with students too. The resource works best when used frequently and regularly - students should store their work carefully in a learning folder or file that they can refer to at any point to support their learning and revision. Students also note down any new, related vocabulary, which builds into a really comprehensive beginner Italian vocabulary bank in a very short space of time.

Laminate the game cards if you can - they are far more learner-friendly, and the additional prep and expense is definitely worth it, as the cards will last in excellent conditional for years. Print & photocopy an appropriate number of quiz card templates and Reference, Recall & Write books. The books are best copied double-sided, and double-stapled on the left-hand side, rather than a single staple in the top left-hand corner for example. This format is again far more reader and writer-friendly, and can be used more effectively as a learning and reference resource.

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Files are non-editable in a zipped format. The resource is copyright, all rights reserved. It may not be copied, rewritten, amended, shared or distributed outside your own classroom in any way. The license for purchase is a single-user license only. Please read the Terms of Use carefully.

MOLTE GRAZIE E BUON APPRENDIMENTO!