Education

In the Devoto-Oli Le Monnier dictionary you will find the Italian of Dante and digital natives, the latest jargon of economists and the most colourful expressions in dialect: from papello to green economy and from lungi to pescetariano. An Italian dictionary is a meeting point where all Italians ought to be able to recognise themselves, a place where the specialised terminology of the scientist can live with the neologism of journalists, the slang of youth, the formal language of literary tradition, the dialects of the different regions and loan words imported from around the world.

The Devoto-Oli is the ideal dictionary for all those who want to have an appropriate control over how they express themselves and use the language on a daily basis and who want to stand out without showing themselves up. A tool that, when used as necessary, makes all the difference.

This is the start of the promotional campaign for the 2012 edition of the ground-breaking Le Monnier dictionary.

The claim developed by the Turin-based advertising company INEDITHA is The 2012 Devoto-Oli: you can tell who uses it. The three “subjects” use a number of polished expressions (chiedo venia, calende greche, sollucchero), in contexts that are familiar to everyone, for example a jokey message between colleagues on an iPad during a meeting; a graffiti message on a wall to a girlfriend and a note left on a windscreen with apologies for damage caused (Chiedo venia per aver urtato la sua macchina).

The campaign will run at 125 Mondadori Franchising and Mondadori Retail outlets around the country and is aimed at the end-user with a view to encouraging purchase: to teens, students, families, to those who study, read and work with the language and not only professionals, teachers and intellectuals.

100 Mondadori bookstore franchises and 25 Retail outlets will have totems, double-sided flags, change machines and promo-card at cash desks and the windows of the outlets will be dressed featuring the three subjects. At both networks monitors will show the campaign video and inside the Mondadori Multicenter in Piazza Duomo in Milan, there will be a giant panel with one of the three subjects.

The campaign will also run in the specialised educational press (Tuttoscuola), in la Repubblica newspaper, the magazines of the two bookstore chains involved in the campaign and, with banners (leaderboards and skyscrapers) on the Ibs, Libraccio and Mondadori Education websites.

The 2012 Devoto-Oli
The 2012 edition of the Devoto-Oli Le Monnier dictionary includes 350 new words, 150,000 clear and exhaustive definitions; 40,000 locutions and clearly indicated expressions; 3,240 two-colour pages; constantly updated scientific terminology, with neologisms such as Evo-Devo (evolution of development), cisgenico, psicocorporeo and mineralogramma.

The selection of new words – that provides a clear indication of the evolution of the language, and that includes the expressions of digital natives, the jargon of economists and a range of current expressions – great importance is given to dialects and foreign loan words. Among the 350 new items included in the new edition are those related to ecology, from current affairs and politics, the world of business and finance, the jargon of TV and newspapers, and the world of youth, from new technologies, fashion and new trends, as well as advertising.

The dictionary is available with a multi-platform DVD-Rom (Windows, Mac and Linux) – that can also be used on an Interactive Multimedia Board, which as well as containing the entire up-dated version of the Devoto-Oli, also includes a dictionary of synonyms and antonyms – and with an annual licence for online consultation, that provides access to the dictionary from any computer in any location.

Finally, the mobile version is available from the Apple Store with the App universale of the 2012 Devoto-Oli for the iPhone and iPad.

Antonio Porro will be the Mondadori Group’s new General Manager Educational from June.
Porro will also be proposed to the respective boards of Mondadori Education and Mondadori Electa for the position of managing director.

Porro, who is from Milan, is 46 and has a degree in economics and business administration. Since January 2009 he has been in charge of Mergers & Acquisitions for the Mondadori Group, reporting directly to the deputy chairman and chief executive, Maurizio Costa.

Porro worked previously at Telecom Italia for a period of more than ten years; since 1995 with responsibilities in the Business Division, where he worked, among other things, on strategic marketing, and, from 2001 at the International Division, where he held a number of positions and focused on support and operations for subsidiaries.
He first worked at Mondadori in the early 1990 when he was responsible for development projects.

The Mondadori Group would like to thank Antonio Baravalle for his precious contribution and the seriousness and competence shown, and wishes him the very best in all his future professional endeavours.

With a new layout and look, the completely renewed Mondadori Education web site – a point of reference for teachers, students and parents – is now online.
The site www.mondadorieducation.it covers all levels and years, from primary to the first and second level secondary, and university, and offers easy and rapid consultation for both catalogues of published materials and training – textbooks, courses, teaching materials and multimedia content in the company’s 12 imprints – as well as new services for teaching:

• @pprendiscienza, is the most extensive database of interactive resources for the study of the sciences in levels I and II of secondary schools with 30,000 digital assets and 1200 virtual lessons. A huge platform that provides digital teaching content and multimedia tools for the creation, integration and extension of daily lessons and the simplification of the work of the teacher;
• Me-book, a new customizable interactive digital book featuring multimedia content. With me-book both teachers and students can have rapid access to the digital content of the book, underline, highlight, make notes, compare documents on different pages, create and personalise lessons using the “slideshow” function and adding text and links directly to slides;
• Libropiùweb, is a new book concept that integrates study with printed texts with technology. The textbook is enriched online with exercises, interactive activities, more detailed background, self-correcting tests MP3 files, film clips, crosswords, conceptual maps and a range of other content;
• LinkYou is a combination of personalised services, created by Mondadori Education for teachers, that includes: Il tuo consulente personale (Your personal consultant) a Mondadori Education contact to assist users in the use of digital teaching materials with LIM and other tools; Il tuo consulente tecnico (Your personal technical consultant) comes into play when teachers want to introduce a teaching activity using new technology; Il tuo consulente didattico e disciplinare (Your personal teaching and disciplinary consultant) available for teachers who have selected Libropiùweb or having difficulties in accessing digital content.

LinkYou is also multimedia teaching seminars: free personalised training courses; a valuable and concrete support to evaluate and make the best use of all of the digital content that accompanies the textbooks chosen by teachers.

The home page also features a dynamic and continuously updated product showcase – contained in a central banner in Flash – a captivating way of presenting to users the new titles in educational publishing for the 2011-2012 academic year.

Scrolling down the page, there are three boxes at the bottom dedicated to the abovementioned services LinkYou, Me-book and the Devoto-Oli, the authoritative Italian dictionary, now edited by well-known linguistic scholars such Luca Serianni and Maurizio Trifone. A complete version of the 2011 edition of the Devoto-Oli dictionary is also available for the iPhone and iPad. The iPad version also allows users to personalise items and to share them on the leading social networks such as Facebook e Twitter, as well as by email.

Other sections provide information concerning the world of education: from teaching films on the Canale video (video channel) to news in “ME&YOU” and Appuntamenti (meetings & events) of interest for teachers.