Italian for beginners （1）

Part One - The Basics
Lesson 1: To Be
To Be
21 letters compose the Italian alphabet. It's missing j, k, w, x and y. If you know the IPA, it will help you a lot since the words are pronounced as they're written. We'll start by teaching you how to introduce yourself in Italian, take a look at the following Italian sentence and its English translation. All Italian text will be written in blue and the English translation in green.
Io sono Davide
I am David
Here we see your very first Italian sentence where you introduce yourself as Davide; you should of course replace the name with your own name. Although the sentence consists of only three words we are going to carefully examine each word. The first word "Io" is the Italian equivalent of the English word "I", also referred to as 1st person singular; it's a subject pronoun. The second word "sono" is a verb; it's a conjugation of the irregular Italian verb "essere", which is one of the Italian equivalents of "to be". Note that, in Italian, the subject pronoun is optional, and it's usually omitted. So you could also say: "Sono Davide", because the verb "sono" already indicates that it is "I" who's saying it. So remember, only use a subject pronoun such as "Io" when you really want to imply that it's absolutely that person who's doing something.
Now we've seen how to introduce yourself using "sono" but we can also introduce other people, take a look at the following examples; we've put the subject pronouns between brackets because they are usually omitted:
 (Io) sono Davide. I am Davide.
 (Tu) sei Davide. You are Davide.
 (Lui) è Davide. He is Davide.
 (Lei) è Giovanna. She is Giovanna.
 È Davide. It is Davide.
 (Noi) siamo Davide e Giovanna. We are Davide and Giovanna.
 (Voi) siete Davide e Giovanna. You are Davide and Giovanna.
 (Loro) sono Davide e Giovanna. They are Davide and Giovanna.
Those are a lot of new words! But it's all very easy. Now you've seen all subject pronouns in Italian, which are usually omitted, and you know how to refer to people. And besides that you've also learned your first Italian verb, an irregular verb: "Essere", in English "To be". In Italian and most other languages, but not in English, there also exists a certain polite form of "you". In Italian they say "Lei" instead of "tu" in formal speech, "tu" is only used among friends, people of the same age and for children. Verbs after "Lei" are conjugated like a 3rd person singular. Take a look at the following sample sentences, and note that the subject pronoun is usually omitted, but for this example we haven't omitted it:
 Lei è nonna You are grandmother
 Lei è Davide You are Davide
And this same construction also applies to the plural form of "you"; instead of "voi" they use "Loro" that is conjugated as a 3rd person plural.
There is also a small new word that appeared in this lesson, the Italian word "e", which means "and". Note that there is no translation for the pronoun "it" in the example. Actually there is one, but is almost never used and you usually omit it. It's also a good exercise to try to pronounce every Italian sentence you see on this page.
 
Vocabulary
 padre father
 madre mother
 nonna grandmother
 nonno grandfather
 
Exercises
In these exercises we ask you to write the subject pronoun between brackets so you learn those too. In the next lessons you can omit the subject pronoun.
Exercise A: Translate to English:
1) (Lui) è Davide.
2) È padre.
3) (Loro) sono Davide e Luigi.
4) (Lei) è madre.
5) (Tu) sei nonna.
6) (Tu) sei nonno.
7) (Noi) siamo George e William.
Exercise B: Translate to Italian:
1) We are James and Jane.
2) You are father. - polite singular form -
3) I am mother.
4) She is grandmother.
5) They are Davide and Luigi.
6) You are George and William.
7) You are grandfather.
Solutions
Solution of Exercise A:
1) He is Davide.
2) It is the father.
3) They are Davide and Luigi.
4) She is mother.
5) You are grandmother.
6) You are grandfather.
7) We are George and William.
Solution of Exercise B:
1) (Noi) siamo James e Jane.
2) (Lei) è padre.
3) (Io) sono madre.
4) (Lei) è nonna.
5) (Loro) sono Davide e Luigi.
6) (Voi) siete George e William.
7) (Tu) sei nonno.