Day 14 of 30
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Past tense — passato prossimo.
Today's lesson is Italian's most-used past tense — passato prossimo, literally 'recent past'. It works for almost everything you've done recently. You'll learn how to form it, the two helping verbs (avere or essere), the most common irregular past participles, and how to describe your weekend in five sentences.
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01With avere
Avere + past participle. Endings: -ato (-are), -uto (-ere), -ito (-ire). The participle never changes form with avere.
9–11 min
02With essere
Movement + change-of-state + reflexive verbs. Past participle agrees with the subject — male/female, singular/plural.
10–12 min
0310 irregulars
Fatto, detto, visto, letto, scritto, aperto, preso, messo, venuto, stato. Three ending families: -tto, -sto, -so.
9–11 min
04Weekend recap
Five-sentence template that answers 'cosa hai fatto nel weekend?'. Mixes avere + essere, regular + irregular, gender agreement.
9–11 min
Must-know irregular past participles — learn these 8
fare → fatto (done), dire → detto (said), vedere → visto (seen), leggere → letto (read), scrivere → scritto (written), aprire → aperto (opened), prendere → preso (taken), mettere → messo (put). These 8 cover 80% of real usage. Memorise them now — they appear in every conversation about the past.
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