In another thread Aran suggested 12 languages in 12 months - implicitly by doing course 1-3 of each language in a month.
So, I ask the question:
Could you do courses 1-3 of Welsh in a month? That’s a rate of approximately three lessons a day, with no repetition (or more if you want to repeat, or fit in listenings), which sounds like it requires people smarter than me!
In the other thread (I think) there is discussion about letting the brain do the consolidation work in what is apparently “down time”, and, I think, research seemed to suggest that people don’t lose what they have learned.
So I guess the 12 lessons in 12 months idea capitalises on the down time in one language, and makes use of it to work on others in parallel … a bit like parallel processing in computing terms.
It still takes a year to learn the one language, but in parallel, you are also learning 11 others.
So back to your question Kev: I think it would be tough. I think it depends what else you are doing. If you were able to live in a Welsh “bubble” the whole time, and in between lessons were speaking and listening to Welsh speakers, it could be extremely effective. But just doing lessons solid for a month, on a fairly steep learning curve…well, I think it would be quite daunting.
I think you could do amazing things if you were immersed for a month in a Welsh-only environment, but doing three lessons alone every day for a month? I think I’d go mad. And I wonder whether you’d end up with someone who’s brilliant at lessons, or someone who’s got useful Welsh.
PS: Best hide this thread from Aran, or he’ll be out to try and find someone to take up the challenge! (sorry Aran… 
There is no way I could do this, but I have read accounts of polygots and serial language learners who seem to be able to acquire tongues at a remarkable rate. I guess one big thing I have learned from SSIW is that I actually can learn a language, whereas I had previously despaired of ever doing so and thought that I was simply not wired up as a language learner. Maybe once you have got over that misapprehension, and got yourself a method for learning, then other languages would become “easier”.
Stu
I have done 3 SSiW lessons in a day before. My brain was pretty fried by the end of it, and I don’t know how much of the last lesson went in!
I am finding, though, that the further I get through the course the less often I have to repeat a class (some of the earlier ones I had to go through about 5 times to make things stick). There is so much that is new towards the end of Course 1, say - especially in the vocab units! - but by the time I’m nearing the end of Course 3 there are a lot of familiar patterns into which the new words can be slotted, so most of it goes in on the first run-through. (I say this now … I don’t yet know what lessons 19 onwards have in store for me! I could be eating my words…)
There are a number of different ways you could go about this, and we’ll no doubt have some interesting discussions once we get close to having the material to give it a whirl…
At the moment, I’m thinking in terms of something like two intensive days a week - maybe three times in a month - I don’t think we’d need to be strict about getting to the end of Level 3, because I think that anyone who’s got to the end of Level 2, and done the listening practices, is going to be able to produce and understand an impressive amount of confident [target language].
We’ve got some 2 day intensive tests coming up in the next few months, which are going to be very interesting indeed - further down the line, I’d love to test 5 day intensive, or even 10 day intensive if anyone survives the 5 day approach…
I learned my first second language late in life - and also after despairing if it would ever happen.
The big inhibitors are uncertainty and the unknown which create stress and fear which are killers for learning.
After learning one foreign language much of the negatives go away. I find I tend to add a language now at the rate of about one a year - though I may be learning two at a time.
I think learning ten languages in ten years is possible - but you need to keep them ‘‘in play’’ and that means there is a practical limit if you want to use them regularly
I think (and hope!) that our accelerated listening exercises are going to be an interesting way to test the boundaries of how many languages it’s possible to keep fairly active - by the time we have recorded dialogues that cover (say) the first 2k words, we might find that an hour a month would be enough to keep a language in working order. It’s going to make for some very interesting testing 
When I was much younger, on a boat to France, my mind failed to find ‘sel’ for salt and, mentally turned off from speaking English, I asked the poor Frenchman for ‘halen’!! If I couldn’t sort out which of three languages was appropriate to a situation in 1971, heaven help me with your suggestion now!!!
Yes, I’m looking forward to that. I would be quite happy to test the boundaries.
I’m finding learning Hebrew structurally (the old fashioned way) is extremely inefficient. SSi does a hugely better job. Hebrew verbs and tenses are quite complicated when learned structurally, so it is a little like rocket science.
I am determined to conquer it but at the expense of energy that could be put to better use.
I
If you learned Hebrew the SSi way, in conversation, and in context, I am convinced the whole thing would simplify. I find that if the whole phrase and pattern is familiar then I remember the correct framing of the verb almost instinctively.
I think that’s a very good description of an enormously important part of the process - our natural ability to identify and use patterns - the same fundamental process as gets described often (by learners and first language speakers) as ‘it just sounds right’… [and so, so much easier than learning and remembering rules!]
Hmm, sounds interesting. I think I want to try. 
You might have been lucky and found a Breton. 
On a similar note (i.e. learning more than one language), could anyone advise me please?
I’m now moving rapidly through Welsh Course One (Southern) and when I come to the end of it, I’m thinking of temporarily suspending Welsh and going for the “Say Something in Dutch” course, and when I have finished that, returning to Welsh. (I’ve neither the time nor the inclination to study two languages side by side!)
I’ve a good reason for wanting to do the Dutch, but I shan’t bore all you good people with the details!
My question: if I do switch to Dutch temporarily, am I likely to find that when I come back to Welsh, I’ve forgotten quite a bit of what I’ve worked so hard to learn?
I look forward to comments- diolch yn fawr!
I’ve spent a lot of time on languages in the last year, with my enthusiasm and attitude greatly enhanced by my SSiW experience and Aran’s advice. One thing that I am now absolutely sure of is that you never really lose what language you learn. It may become a little rusty and need some polishing, but it is still there. I first studied German thirty years ago but let it go almost completely dormant quite a while ago. After this last year of refreshment I find it has all come back. Words that I know I have not used or heard for years come popping out of my mouth.
Now I’ve finished all the extant Welsh materials here, and am (patiently!) waiting as the Level 2 lessons dribble out. Following Aran’s advice I’ve taken to jumping into the new lessons as soon as they are available without any review of the previous ones, and so far I’ve been pleasantly surprised to find that the old stuff is still there.
So my advice is that if you want to switch to Dutch for a while, don’t worry. It won’t hurt your future Welsh progress at all.
Oh, I did, Mike bach, they were all Bretons but said that some of their grandfathers spoke the language, not them!! Yet a friend of mine, not much older than me, remembered Breton onion sellers speaking a sort of Breton/Cymraeg mix & being totally understandable!
May I add one warning to this! It depends how old you are. Fine for adults, but if you have a small child speaking Cymraeg and then move some place else and don’t keep up their Cymraeg, they’ll forget it. I’ve said elsewhere in the Forum that I spoke as good German as anything else from age 3-4 when frequenting a POW camp, but could remember none by the time I was about 6!!
I have heard that too. However, could it still have helped your pronunciation, if and whenever you try to speak German now?
Yeah, I think this is entirely on the money (with some fine tuning when you’re talking about early acquisition in children) - you’ll definitely find a bit of a gear-change when you come back to Welsh, but you’ll get over it very quickly
I don’t expect SSi to satisfy my every wish and dream, but if you manage to build our vocabulary up to 2k words through dialogues in each language SSi teaches, then you have come pretty close to utopia.
Here’s a toast to amazing experiences to come.