The text is structured into a practical course that aims to be both fun and easy to work through. Each point is explained clearly, and the reader is provided with plenty of opportunities to practice what they have learnt. The course can be worked through at any pace, and readers can arrange learning to suit their needs. Based on the Council of Europe's Threshold guidelines on language learning, the course contains: graded units of dialogue, culture notes, grammar and exercises; a pronunciation guide; the 1500 words most frequently used in Portuguese; a Portuguese-English vocabulary; tables of regular and irregular verbs; indexes to the grammar, problem words and themes; and special reference is given to Brazilian Portuguese forms.