Glasgow is home to Scotland’s largest Italian community – generations of café and chip-shop families from Barga and the Ciociaria. Whether it’s heritage or curiosity, learn Italian in live online lessons with a native Sicilian teacher.
Looking for an Italian tutor in Glasgow? Lessons are one-to-one over Microsoft Teams, tailored to you — complete beginner, GCSE revision, holiday Italian or reconnecting with the family language. As a private Italian tutor I charge £30 an hour, with no travel time and no course-book padding: we spend the whole lesson actually speaking.
Learn Italian from anywhere in the UK with live online lessons taught by Laura — a native Italian speaker from Sicily with over 20 years’ teaching experience, fully qualified with QTS, a PGCE and the Cambridge CELTA.
How online lessons work
- Live video lessons — real conversation with a real teacher, not an app
- One-to-one tuition — £30/hour, scheduled around you, Monday to Friday
- Small group courses — £15 per 1.5-hour session, 10-week terms from £150
- Interactive materials — custom resources, BookWidgets and Kahoot activities, all provided
Who they’re for
- Complete beginners building the foundations
- Improvers and returners who want structured conversation practice
- Students preparing for IB Diploma, GCSE or A-level Italian examinations
- Anyone with Italian family, travel plans, or a love of the language
Every lesson is tailored to your goals and level. As a specialist SEN-trained teacher, Laura is particularly experienced at supporting learners who find languages daunting — and at making every session genuinely enjoyable.
Ready to start? Get in touch for a free chat about your level and goals, or meet Laura in her welcome video — wherever you are in the UK.
Ready to start? Join the 10-week online beginners’ course — starts 16 September (£150)
Not ready yet? Grab the free 50 Essential Italian Phrases PDF
“Laura is a great teacher — warm, friendly, knowledgeable and encouraging. I really like the style of the lessons with a combination of conversation and worked exercises.”
— Jess Read all my Google reviews →
Glasgow’s Italian connection
Glasgow fell for Italy through ice cream. In 1903 the city had 89 Italian-run ice cream shops; by 1905 there were around 336. A few Presbyterian voices were scandalised, but working-class Glaswegians took the cafes to their hearts — and by the First World War Glasgow’s Italian community, largely Tuscan, was the third-largest in Britain, more than 4,000 strong.
That story is still being written. The University Cafe on Byres Road, opened by Pasquale Verrecchia in 1918, remains in the same family’s hands, and the Italian Cloister Garden on Clyde Street shelters a 200-year-old olive tree gifted by the people of Tuscany. When Glaswegians learn Italian with me, they are continuing a conversation their city began over a century ago.
Common questions
Do you teach face-to-face in Glasgow, or online?
Online, over Microsoft Teams. I’m based in Gloucestershire, and teaching online means Glasgow students and I can meet weekly without a single train ticket. Lessons are live and personal — we speak Italian together from the very first session, whatever your starting level.
How much do Italian lessons cost?
One-to-one lessons are £30 an hour. There’s also my ten-week online beginners course at £150 for the whole course — Wednesday evenings, 5.00 to 6.30, starting 16 September, in a small group.
I come from a Glasgow Italian family — can you help me find the language again?
It would be a pleasure. Glasgow’s Italian families — many with roots in the cafés and ice cream parlours generations of Glaswegians grew up with — often kept the food and the warmth but lost the words. Together we can find them again, at your own pace.
Does Glasgow really have a deep Italian history?
It truly does. Police statistics recorded 89 Italian-run ice cream shops in 1903 and around 336 by 1905, and by the First World War Glasgow held Britain’s third-largest Italian community, over 4,000 people. The University Cafe on Byres Road has been run by the Verrecchia family since 1918, and the Italian Cloister Garden on Clyde Street is the world’s largest memorial to the Arandora Star victims of 1940.