Welcome to the Yabla Italia newscast bringing you the latest news on sports, politics and weather. There's also a special report on a very special pigeon!

This newscast is completely dedicated to Christmas and the holidays... no news of the world or politics. Be careful, though, there's an unexpected guest!

Join Marika, Guido, and Anna for the latest news, sports, and weather including a news flash about a new, painless way of learning languages!

Get the latest news, sports and weather (and the vocabulary for understanding it!) from Marika, Guido and Anna. And don't miss one of the latest inventions on the market!

A very special edition of the news with Marika, Guido, Serena and Anna.

Marika's newscast gives you a taste of what to expect when watching the news in Italy!

What's going on in Italy? Marika, Guido, Serena, and Anna give you the latest.

"Little Red Riding Hood" in a modern interpretation featuring Anna in the title role. Marika, on the other hand, has been miraculously transformed into a classic Italian nonna (grandma).

Magpies [gazze ladre] in folklore are known to be attracted by shiny things. Rossini's opera La Gazza Ladra recounts the story of Ninetta, a servant girl. She is wrongly accused of stealing the silverware that the family magpie stole.

Ninetta is in prison, condemned to death, and things are looking very bleak, indeed. Don't worry though; in the end, love and justice win out, and everyone except the magistrate lives happily ever after.

Marika and Anna conjugate the verb to be in the simple present, present perfect, and simple past.

Anna and Marika give examples of the past tense of the verb to be.

Marika and Anna go over the future and conditional tenses for the verb essere (to be). The vocabulary review covers the future and the conditional conjugations for this verb.

Anna and Marika take us through the imperative, the subjunctive and the gerund forms of the verb, essere (to be). The subjunctive is used less and less in modern English, so it can be tricky to learn in Italian, but little by little even these forms will become part of your Italian language skills.

Anna and Marika introduce the verb avere (to have) and show us the conjugation in the present, present perfect, simple past and past perfect.