Intermediate Italian Level 1 

Unit 1 - Review #1 

Italian Foundations 
 

Before diving into new stuff, it is always wise to make sure we have strong foundations.  

In this video lesson we reviewed: 

Gender of Nouns & Adjectives 

Plurals of Nouns & Adjectives 
Exceptions with Plurals 
Definite Articles 
Indefinite Articles 
Sentence Structure 

How do you feel about all these topics? Where is confidence when it comes to these aspects on 
the Italian grammar?  

It is essential that you be honest about this and never become complacent with your knowledge. 
It is a fact: we know a lot more than what we remember to use.  

And it’s OK!  

That is exactly why we need to re-inforce all concepts and check if we can apply them.  

Refer back to the original Lessons from ​Beginner Italian Level 1​ and ​Beginner Italian Level 2​ if 
you need to go deeper with your review. Contact ​Support​ for a great deal on those two courses, 
if you don’t have them.  

   

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 Intermediate Italian Level 1 

Gender of Nouns and Adjectives 

- Italian nouns have gender (masculine or feminine) 
- Gender is fixed and “randomly” assigned 
- Adjectives need to match the gender of the noun they are describing 
- Singular masculine words ​usually​ end in​ -O 
- Singular feminine words ​usually​ end in​ -A 
- Singular Italian words end in ​-E ​are harder to guess, as they can be either masculine or 
feminine (but still, one or the other) 
- These words are clearly masculine: ​divano, bagno, vino 
- These words are clearly feminine: ​panna, casa, pizza 
- These words are hard to guess: ​elefante ​(masculine), ​chiave ​(feminine), c​ ane ​(masculine) 
- Similarly to nouns, adjectives can end in ​-O​ for masculine or ​-A​ for feminine, but some end 
in ​-E​, and can be used to describe both genders.  

Divani bianco 
Casa bianca 
Elefante bianco 
Chiave bianca 
Divano grande 
Casa grande 
Elefante grande 
Chiave grande 

- In the above examples, BIANCO changes the ending for masculine and feminine, while 
GRANDE does not.  
 
Your Notes 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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Plurals of Nouns and Adjectives 

- Plural masculine words ​usually​ end in​ -I 
- Plural feminine words ​usually​ end in​ -E 
- Singular Italian words ending in ​-E ​usually end in ​-I​ in the plural (and the gender is hard to 
guess) 
- These words are masculine: ​divani, bagni, vini, elefanti, cani 
- These words are feminine: ​panne, case, pizze, chiavi 
- elefanti (​ masculine), ​chiavi ​(feminine), c​ ani ​(masculine) are plurals of word ending in ​-E​ in 
the singular, and therefore confusing 
- When in doubt with a word ending in ​-I​, it is safer to assume that it is a masculine plural 
- Adjectives have to match the number of the nouns 
- Similarly to nouns, plural adjectives can end in ​-I​ for masculine or ​-E​ for feminine, but 
adjectives ending in ​-E​ in the singular, usually end in ​-I​ in the plural,​ a
​ nd can be used to 
describe both genders.  

Divano bianchi 
Case bianche 
Elefanti bianchi 
Chiavi bianche 
Divani grandi 
Case grandi 
Elefanti grandi 
Chiavi grandi 

- In the above examples, BIANCO changes the ending for masculine plural to ​-I​ and for 
feminine plural to ​-E​, while GRANDE only changes its ending to ​-I​ for plurals, regardless of 
gender (yet it is a masculine or feminine adjective) 

Your Notes 

 
 
 
 
 
 

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Exceptions with Plurals 

- Foreign words do not change in the plural 
- Adjectives describing plural foreign words still need to express gender and number 
(gender being harder to tell for foreign words and number being given away from context 
and the articles used) 

Lo sport >  Gli sport 

Lo sport americano >  Gli sport americani 

- Words ending with an accented syllable do not change in the plural 

- Adjectives describing these plural words still need to express gender and number  

Un caffè corto  >  Due caffè corti 

Una città bella >  Due città belle 

- Some exotic animals ending in ​-A​ in the singular do not change in the plural (and are 
usually masculine!) 
- Adjectives describing these plural words still need to express gender and number  

Un koala piccolo >  Due Koala piccoli 

Un gorilla simpatico >  Due gorilla simpatici 

- Some words deriving from Greek ending in ​-I​ in the singual do not change in the plural 
- These are often the same words that end in ​-IS​ in English 
- Adjectives describing these plural words still need to express gender and number  

Una crisi politica >  Due crisi politiche 

Un’analisi chimica >  Due analisi chimiche 
 

Your Notes 

 
 
 
 
 
 

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 Intermediate Italian Level 1 

Definite Articles  
- Yes, Italian has seven ways to say ​THE 
- IL​ is used for singular masculine words 
- LO​ is used for singular masculine words starting with a strong (double) consonant sound, 
like ​Z​, ​GN​, ​GL​, ​X​, ​Y​, ​S+Consonant​, ​PS​…  
- L’​ is used for singular masculine words starting with a vowel 
- I​ is used for plural masculine words 
- GLI​ is used for the plural of those masculine words that use ​LO​ and ​L​ in the singular 
- The ‘default’ articles for masculine words are ​IL / I ​and we are going to use these unless 
an exception is present (for which we will use ​LO​, ​L​, and ​GLI​) 
- LA​ is used for singular feminine words 
- L’​ is used for singular feminine words that start with a vowel 
- LE​ is used for all plural feminine words 
- The ‘default’ articles for feminine words are ​LA / LE ​and we are going to use these unless 
the feminine word is starts with a vowel and is singular (for which we use ​L’​) 

Il divano 
I divani 
La ragazza 
Le ragazze 
Lo studente 
Gli studenti 
L’aquilone 
Gli aquiloni 
L’insalata 
Le insalate 

- In italian the article is chosen based on the word that follows to improve sound and 
simplify pronunciation 
- Nouns do not ‘own’ an article 
- If we inserted the adjective STRANO in one of its forms between the article and the noun, 
we will notice that some articles need to change: 

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Il divano strano  Lo​ strano divano 

I divani strani  Gli​ strani divani 
La ragazza strana  La strana ragazza 
Le ragazze strane  Le strane ragazze 
Lo studente strano  Lo strano studente 
Gli studenti strani  Gli strani studenti 
L’aquilone strano  Lo​ strano aquilone 
Gli aquiloni strani  Gli strani aquiloni 
L’insalata strana  La​ strana insalata 
Le insalate strane  Le strane insalate 

Your Notes 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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 Intermediate Italian Level 1 

Indefinite Articles  
- In English, ​A​ and ​AN ​are Indefinite Articles 
- UN​ is used for singular masculine words 
- UNO​ is used for singular masculine words starting with a strong (double) consonant 
sound, like ​Z​, ​GN​, ​GL​, ​X​, ​Y​, ​S+Consonant​, ​PS​…  
- The ‘default’ indefinite article for masculine words is ​UN​, unless there is need to use ​UNO 
- UNA​ is used for singular feminine words 
- UN’ ​is used for singular feminine words that start with a vowel 
- The ‘default’ indefinite article for feminine words is ​UNA​, unless there is need to use ​UN’ 
- UN’​ can only be used for feminine words - masculine words that start with a vowel just 
use the default ​UN 

Un cappuccino 
Una castagna 
Uno scandalo 
Uno gnomo 
Uno zaino 
Uno xilofono 
Un’anatra 
Un’amica 
Un amico 
Un’isola 

Your Notes 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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 Intermediate Italian Level 1 

Sentence Structure  
- Like English, Italian is an ​S V O​ language, that is, ​Subject > Verb > Object 
- In the specific, an Italian sentence might look like: 

Article + Noun + Adjective + Verb + Article + Noun 

Il cane nero mangia la mela  

- Adverbs ​are usually placed right after the verb 

Il cane nero mangia spesso la mela 
 
- To make a verb ​negative​, we place ​NON ​right before the verb (or the pronoun, if the verb 
is already preceded by one) 
Il cane nero non mangia la mela 
 
- ​ AI, NIENTE, NESSUNO​ (​never, nothing, nobody​), 
When using ​negative words​ such as M
in Italian the verb still needs to be preceded by ​NON​: 
Il cane nero non mangia mai la mela 
 
- Overall, Italian has the same structure as English (except when it comes to questions), and 
we should not be overly worried 
- As long as we apply the main rules of the Italian language (omission of subject pronouns, 
abundance of definite articles, positioning of the adjective after the noun etc), we’ll be fine 
- Italian is more flexible than English when it comes to where we place blocks on content 

Your Notes 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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 Intermediate Italian Level 1 

Your Notes 

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