The teacher has a different look today, as she quizzes Anna about the Piedmont region of Italy. Anna tries to get on the good side of her irritable maestra.

In this lesson we start looking at the comparative forms of adjectives. Unlike English, where we have a dedicated comparative and superlative form, Italian makes use of adverbs più "more" or meno "less" and the prepositions or conjunctions di (of, than) or che (than, that) in addition to the adjective itself. Daniela shows us how this works.

We're going to school to learn about The Marches, the only Italian region to have a plural name! Let's find out if Anna has studied this time! Let's see how mean her maestra is today, too.

Daniela explains three situations in which the remote past may be used and gives us examples of each situation. But don't worry, this tense is not mandatory and Daniela suggests the passato prossimo (present perfect) as a valid alternative. Note: The passato prossimo is constructed like the English present perfect tense (with a helping verb and past participle), but is used more like the English past simple.

Daniela explains how to conjugate the remote past of the verbs avere (to have) and prendere (to take).

Daniela discusses the verbs finire [to finish] and essere [to be] in the remote past tense.

Daniela starts her four-part series on the passato remoto [remote or absolute past] verb tense. This tense is broadly used in the south of Italy, and infrequently in the north.

Daniela shows us how to conjugate the imperfect tense of the following irregular verbs: dire (to say), fare (to make, to do), bere (to drink), condurre (to drive), and porre (to pose). She gives us a helpful tip for remembering how.

Daniela discusses how the imperfect is used to describe actions in the past that are happening contemporaneously.

How much is too much? Marika explains about quantity, and shares some common idioms about quantity and degree that can come in very handy.

Daniela concentrates on the modal verbs essere [to be] and avere [to have] in the imperfect tense.

Daniela discusses the imperfect tense for verbs ending in -are, -ere, and -ire.

Daniela continues her lesson on necessity or need, providing examples with an impersonal subject. In English the impersonal can be expressed with "one" in the third person: "one needs," or by using the passive voice:"Something needs to be done." And in informal speech, we might use "you" or "we.": "you need to..."

Daniela, in the first part of a two-part series, shows us how to express need in a personal way with the noun bisogno [need].

It may come as a relief to see that Italian adverbs of manner are similar to English ones. But when Marika starts giving us some [very useful] idiomatic adverbial phrases using adjectives, it's slightly more complicated.