I built the course I could actually finish
My name is Vadym. I'm a developer from Ukraine, I've been living in Italy for six years and I'm learning Italian. PersoLingua is the course I put together once I noticed I quit ordinary audio courses by lesson three. Here's why.
Story
Six years in Italy — and speaking is still hard
I tried everything: online courses, group classes, English for IT, tutors, apps like Duolingo and Learner AI. Nothing helped. Whenever I tried to speak Italian, I kept feeling that this language wasn't mine. The thought alone made me sad.
Only an audio course worked
It was Pimsleur. I listened to two lessons while swimming laps — and started to get the basics, fix my mistakes and speak more correctly. It clearly worked. But in lesson three I lost focus, and then interest.
Because it got boring
In the lessons, some Mark — a family man with two kids and an office job — drank coffee, read the paper and talked football with his friends. I have no kids, I don't read papers, I don't like coffee, and the sport I follow is boxing. Someone else's life in my headphones — and ten minutes in I no longer knew why I was listening.
So I built a course about my own life
The format itself suited me: just headphones, and you learn Italian at the gym, driving, on a walk, at the computer, in the supermarket queue. But whichever audio course I tried, it was the same Mark and the same papers. I believed that with artificial intelligence it could be different: the same level syllabus and all the grammar you need, but examples from my life, so my focus wouldn't drift and the course kept bringing me back to the lesson. I also wanted the course to adapt to my progress. That's how PersoLingua started.
How I knew it worked
I installed my app for a friend. Oleh is also from Ukraine and has lived in Italy for 15 years: his Italian is perfect. But he travels around Europe a lot, where he needs English — and he spoke none at all.
Right there in the bar I gave him one earbud. He listened and repeated, and I sat watching my method work on someone else. That's when I knew the method works. I was very pleased with myself.
But the real surprise came a week later: Oleh greeted me and ordered at a café in English. After that I coded PersoLingua twenty hours a day and started putting together a team of professionals to take the first version to the App Store and Google Play.
The programme adapts to you
Topics and grammar of the level come in order, and the programme itself adapts to you.
Examples come from your life
Your people, work and plans appear where they help a topic stick. Not in every sentence.
You listen and repeat
You listen, answer in the pause, repeat. About 12 minutes a lesson.
You reinforce it in practice
We strongly recommend the practice exercises: vocabulary, rules, pronunciation, listening. Add unfamiliar words to your dictionary, and take a short test after each lecture — optional, but worth it.
What matters to us
- You pay for a level, not a subscription.
- You can delete your account in the app under Settings → Privacy. To get a copy of your data, email hello@persolingua.com.
- A person answers your email, not a bot.
What matters to me is that the course really helps
I believe a personal audio course suits best those who have already tried to learn a language — English, say — and didn't get where they wanted.
500 hours is enough practice to learn a language to a good level. But the 40 hours available now are enough to understand the language and learn its core.
- 40–45 hours
- in one course today
- ≈500 hours
- of listening practice we'll add over the next six months
- free
- for everyone who has already bought a course
Get in touch
If you want to ask or suggest something, write to me directly. I read everything myself.
Seller: Vadym Melnychenko, sole trader (ditta individuale). VAT number (P.IVA): 01889430334. Address: Via Bandiera Fratelli 14, 29015 Castel San Giovanni (PC), Italia.