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Italy Trip 2019

Student reflections

In Florence, we were able to experience going to a language school for five days. It was for three and a half hours each day and we were only allowed to speak Italian and write in Italian. The year 11s were split into a different class with Michele as their teacher, and the year 10s had Daniele. Of course it was tough at first, but we were able to adjust pretty quickly and learn so many new things. During classes at Siena, we learn a lot of grammatical language so when overseas and continuously speaking Italian we were able to learn the correct way to speak formally and informally, as well as in different tenses. It was an amazing experience and I will never forget it. 
Anna Griss 

Over our time in Italy, we went to school in Florence. It was a very fun and enjoyable time with our teacher Daniele. Throughout our days in school, we learnt a lot more Italian grammar and we improved on our speaking, as our teacher didn’t speak to us in English.
Alessia Di Donato

Due to the fact that we were only spoken to in Italian by our teachers, we really improved our listening and understanding skills. We were able to broaden our knowledge of different vocabulary on a variety of different subjects. We all loved the time that we spent at school in Florence, and we thought that it was a wonderful once in a lifetime learning opportunity.
Molly O’Farrell 

At language school, we learnt a lot more conversation as our teacher, Daniele, was only speaking Italian. I really enjoyed playing lots of Italian games while also incorporating the language into it, meaning we were learning but in a fun way. 
Olivia Efthimiou 

In Italy, when we first arrived, it was very overwhelming at first to hear only Italian. It took us a few days to fully get the flow of how to respond and ask questions when ordering food or buying clothes at the local shops. Our Italian had improved by the end because we were learning new ways to have a basic conversation with someone, and felt more confident with our Italian.
Julia Bendinelli

While in Italy we were expected to speak as much Italian as we could: ordering food, purchasing things and just talking to anyone in general. I personally found ordering food in Italian pretty easy, although the server always replied in English! In the smaller cities where there weren’t many tourists it was harder to communicate because we couldn’t simply ask ‘parla inglese?’ if they didn’t understand our Italian. Overall, I now know many more phrases and can fluently order a pizza in Italian.
Stella Zavattieri 

WOW the food in Italy is amazing!  Every night we went out for dinner and had a delicious meal. Most of us either had gnocchi, spaghetti or pizza. The pizza in Australia is nothing compared to the pizza in Italy. It had a thin base with lots of toppings and a puffed crust that tasted amazing. Seeing as though food in Italy seems pretty cheap, we all got a three course meal which usually started off with getting bruschetta as entree (toasted bread topped with chopped tomatoes, oregano and salt and pepper). It was then followed by main course and then a traditional dessert. During the day, at lunch time, we were free to roam and explore with friends. We usually had a panino, after lunch most of us went and got an ice-cream which I think was everyone’s favourite time of day. I can’t even begin to tell how amazing the sorbet and ice-cream was, and how many different flavors there were to choose from.
Siena Butyn 



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