I have a few questions regarding the 6 month Welsh speaker course.
For a bit of background, this is the third time I am attempting to go through the course, due to my historic inability to stick to things. This time I have gone further than the other times and it’s different because I am very enthusiastic to come home and do the next session.
I am in an advantageous position as I was taught Welsh in school so my understanding of individual words is ok but I cannot produce sentences and my speaking has improved more in the seven challenges of SSIW than in the five years or studying in school.
Also, I have a few colleagues that are Welsh speakers that are very happy for me to practice with them so I have a good opportunity to speak and listen in conversation on a potentially daily basis.
I am on week four so have completed the first seven challenges and I am quite comfortable with them. The way the six month course is designed is to do two challenges per week. I am more than happy to push through the challenges and have been doing one on the Monday and the second on Tuesday,
The questions are
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Is there any harm in repeating the challenges during the week? I am completing the challenges to a reasonable level in the first run through so far but of course this will probably change in future. This would just be for additional repetitions until the next two challenges the week after?
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Would it be better to just move ahead with the challenges and do more than two each week?
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The listening practice and the words/sentences to practice appear to align well with the six month approach, would it be more beneficial to complete these and wait for the new challenges each week or have less repetitions of these due to moving on to the next challenges quicker?
Many thanks,
Gethyn
It sounds like you’re doing brilliantly this time around, Gethyn. It really does make a difference having people to practise with, so do make the most of that.
The course is flexible enough to fit around the needs of individuals, so don’t worry about sticking rigidly to the ‘plan’. By all means repeat the challenges during the week if you wish. The reason it’s suggested to ‘keep pushing on’ is so that people don’t over-repeat in order to get everything spot on and then get bored or disillusioned, but certainly repeating now and then will do no harm.
If you feel you can do more than 2 challenges a week, that’s great - it’s fine to take things at a pace that suits you and this might mean doing more some weeks and less in others (because now and then there are some challenges that are harder), so find what works for you but remember not to get disheartened if you start to go quicker and then can’t keep up that pace - it’s fine to drop down a notch again!
Do the listening practices when they pop up - even if you’ve moved on a bit, they are still beneficial, so don’t skip on these due to moving on quicker. Many people struggle with listening even though they are fine with speaking, but honing listening skills helps with speaking because it builds pattern recognition.
Dal ati - you’re doing great!
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Thank you very much for the response Siaron, I’ve worked my way into challenge 10 where the double speed listening comes in and I think it’s excellent. It feels like it is forcing my brain to take words and phrases at face value, there are a few in there where I didn’t quite catch what was said but I know with a few more listens I will notice it.
I’m very impressed with SSIW so far and how well things are sticking so far. I have noticed though that in the challenges the material from that specific challenge is hard but when the repetition comes in the next challenge or the one after it’s much easier to respond.
Diolch yn fawr
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