Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

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dylan413
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Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

Postby dylan413 » Thu Aug 25, 2022 11:08 am

Does anyone know of any textbooks in any language that they recommend for any language that are straight and to the point?

Most textbooks that I come across are designed for classroom use and are packed with exercises that only really work in settings with multiple people. Furthermore, they often are flashy and "fluffy." In short, in attempts to attract attention and maintain the interest of their readers, they water down their content. While this may be good for some people, I find that this usually just distracts and frustrates me. I love working with textbooks. It's one of my preferred methods of language learning and it helped me a lot with Russian and other languages. However, I prefer textbooks that explain the rules and exceptions, provide example sentences, and keys to their exercises (so that I can be certain I'm applying what I've learned correctly) without the additional unnecessary "fluff."

Interestingly enough, while there are many resources out there for Italian, I'm struggling to find a textbook that fits this criteria. If anyone has textbooks they recommend for Italian or any language for that matter, I'd be happy to hear your recommendations.

I can start by saying that I have really enjoyed the following textbooks:


Azerbaijani
Teach Yourself Azerbaijani by T.M.Khudazarov

Latin
Ecce Romani I and II

Russian
В Пути by Olga Kagan
Golosa: A Basic Course in Russian

Ukrainian
Modern Ukrainian
Colloquial Ukrainian by Ian Press

While a few of these textbooks may have been designed for classroom use (it's been a long time and I don't have access to them at the moment, so I can't verify, these are some textbooks that generally met the criteria I described above and really helped me with the learning process.
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BeaP
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Re: Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

Postby BeaP » Thu Aug 25, 2022 3:28 pm

I can recommend you 4 monolingual Italian textbooks.

1. La lingua italiana per stranieri
https://www.amazon.com/lingua-italiana-stranieri-Lehrbuch/dp/8855705261
It's a bit too grammar-focused but still very good, because the example sentences and the exercises are based on the 2000 most frequent words. New vocabulary is always collected at the bottom of the page.

2. Un giorno in Italia
https://www.loescher.it/dettaglio/opera/o_b3740/un-giorno-in-italia
It's for classroom use, but I find it very close to the category you're searching for. It's based on a narrative, I personally find it very interesting. The key for the first volume needs to be bought separately (it's in the glossary), the key for the second volume is on the CD. It's the old version, out of print, but some copies can still be found online. A personal favourite.

3. Parla e scrivi
https://www.parlaescrivi.it/en/
I haven't used this one, but it seems to meet your criteria.

4. In italiano
https://www.gludistribuzione.com/books/index.cfm?node=0,1,4,30,225,229
This isn't just a grammar (although it says so on the cover), it also has a lot dialogues and texts. The key has to be bought separately.

For French I recommend Vite et bien. The key is included. Even writing exercises have a proposed solution.
https://www.cle-international.com/adolescents/vite-et-bien-1-niveaux-a1a2-livre-cd-2eme-edition-9782090385236.html
Last edited by BeaP on Sat Aug 27, 2022 5:40 am, edited 1 time in total.
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polllyglot
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Re: Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

Postby polllyglot » Fri Aug 26, 2022 11:23 pm

BeaP wrote:I can recommend you 4 monolingual Italian textbooks.

1. La lingua italiana per stranieri
https://www.amazon.com/lingua-italiana-stranieri-Lehrbuch/dp/8855705261
It's a bit too grammar-focused but still very good, because the example sentences and the exercises are based on the 3000 most frequent words. New vocabulary is always collected at the bottom of the page.

2. Un giorno in Italia
https://www.loescher.it/dettaglio/opera/o_b3740/un-giorno-in-italia
It's for classroom use, but I find it very close to the category you're searching for. It's based on a narrative, I personally find it very interesting. The key for the first volume needs to be bought separately (it's in the glossary), the key for the second volume is on the CD. It's the old version, out of print, but some copies can still be found online. A personal favourite.

3. Parla e scrivi
https://www.parlaescrivi.it/en/
I haven't used this one, but it seems to meet your criteria.

4. In italiano
https://www.gludistribuzione.com/books/index.cfm?node=0,1,4,30,225,229
This isn't just a grammar (although it says so on the cover), it also has a lot dialogues and texts. The key has to be bought separately.

For French I recommend Vite et bien. The key is included. Even writing exercises have a proposed solution.
https://www.cle-international.com/adolescents/vite-et-bien-1-niveaux-a1a2-livre-cd-2eme-edition-9782090385236.html


Audio for La lingua italiana per stranieri
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-BKjO- ... 7Na92VpP_2
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lowsocks
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Re: Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

Postby lowsocks » Sat Aug 27, 2022 2:34 am

Have you considered "Teach Yourself Italian" by Kathleen Speight? It was first published in the 1940's, and like many of the first-generation of the Teach Yourself series, is heavily focused on grammar and translation, both Italian to English and English to Italian. It includes an answer key for the exercises and translations of the reading passages.

I have not studied Italian myself, so I cannot give an opinion on the book. But several copies are available on the internet archive (https://archive.org). They can be viewed online (though not downloaded, it seems), and this may help you decide if you would want to buy a used copy. (The book is long out of print.)
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One need not hope in order to undertake, nor succeed in order to persevere.

lowsocks
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Re: Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

Postby lowsocks » Sat Aug 27, 2022 6:18 pm

It turns out that there is quite a nice copy of Kathleen Speight's Teach Yourself Italian on the internet archive, available for download. Indeed, once you download it, you'll find that it even comes with a nice clickable table of contents as a sidebar. (Some of the cataloguing information for this copy is a bit nonstandard, which may make it difficult to find in a search).
https://archive.org/details/TYItalian1963
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One need not hope in order to undertake, nor succeed in order to persevere.

Biofacticity
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Re: Textbooks for the study of any language designed for independent learners and are straight and to the point?

Postby Biofacticity » Wed Sep 21, 2022 6:23 pm

I am also searching for this type of textbook but for German
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