Course 1 Northern Am I Normal? (plus remaining Level 2 North course notes)

@4Ruth Try this: Northern Level 1 Content Guide

The FAQ is different on the original vs. new/beta websites, I think that might be why you are having trouble.

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Got it!! Thanks so much Anna.
As always the people on this forum are all so helpful. Much appreciated. Thank you all.

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Maybe only the new layout has those links. Looks like @AnnaC got it sorted for you.

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Thanks Craig. Can’t wait to crack on with the Challenges now!

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Thanks for the kind words, folks - don’t worry, I don’t beat myself up over the vocabs too much…:wink:

But I am very conscious that they only came into existence because I saw at first hand on the initial Bootcamps that people who’d done Course 1 had some important gaps, so we needed to fill them - and then the vocabs for Course 2 were just a matter of continuing the pattern without really thinking all that closely about it…

The Levels, by contrast, are designed from the start to include the key stuff that wasn’t in Course 1, and to weave vocab extension into the main body of the course, which is why there aren’t separate vocab units on the Levels - which in turn means that the spaced repetition for vocab introduced in the Levels is much, much better… :sunny:

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I wasn’t sure where to put this, but … Has anyone else had a problem of thinking they know the Cymraeg for something, failing to find it in a dictionary and discovering via Google that it is from another language? I have always tended to put in, say Cymraeg, when feeling for and failing to find a word in, say French, but this isn’t quite the same!! I was sure ā€˜Tir na nog’ meant ā€˜Fairyland’!! It sort of does, but in Irish Gaelic, which I have never learned!!!

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I find myself inserting French words when I don’t know the Cymraeg word, and only realising afterwards. Only/seulement is a common culprit. I’ve not studied French for 6 years, since I was at school, but it seems I remember a lot more of it accidentally than I am able to reproduce consciously…

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Hi Ruth. I know I’m miles behind you but I just wanted to tell you how encouraging I have found reading your various comments as I have also started aged 51 (just finished Northern Course 1: 6.2) and didn’t know how I would get on, particularly as a friend who teaches German at the university (Birmingham) said he’d tried learning Welsh and found that, being in his fifties, was too old and gave up! I have managed to stick to a bit each day for the last 3 weeks and am really enjoying this method of learning. There’s a strong possibility that we may move to Wales in a few years, and I would like to at least be able to have some sort of conversations with Welsh speakers. And thank you, Aran and the team, for such an excellent resource.

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I had the opposite problem in France shortly after the boot camp last April. When I thanked a waitress in Lyon she looked puzzled and I then realised I’d said diolch yn fawr.

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Helo! I’m so pleased that my learning journey has encouraged or helped anyone! Welcome to the forum, and you are doing so well yourself to have got that far in 3 weeks. Your university friend who couldn’t learn Cymraeg didn’t have SSiW so perhaps that’s why he struggled! I also know a lady who is French, but also speaks Spanish in addition to English - and she threw her hands in the air in a very Gallic expression of horror when I told her I was learning Welsh, exclaiming that Welsh is ’ so so hard!’ . It did make me feel a little bit brainy and smug that she was impressed with me doing it but i really think it’s just got a bad reputation!

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@4Ruth @Kays Okay, so we could form a club…I’m the same age, too. :slight_smile: Welcome to the forum, Kays.

@4Ruth Your journey has encouraged and inspired me, too. And, you have every right to feel brainy! I’m impressed by how quickly you are progressing. I don’t know if Welsh is really hard, or if it just has a bad reputation, but we can just let everyone think we’re really smart, can’t we? :wink:

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I love that Anna! Yes I do agree that it’s a good thing if everyone thinks we are incredibly brainy and we must not dispel that illusion!

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Yes!! Except in my case the ā€˜another language’ is Welsh… from my childhood (ok, so that’s a moment or two ago) but I’m staggered as to how different the language is now.

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A warm welcome to the forum, Kays, and thank you very much indeed for your very kind words :sunny:

I’ll recommend the course to him! And of course we’re brainy - because we found our way to this site! Thanks for your reply (and yours too, Anna). I’ve never used a forum before, and it’s lovely to have such helpful and friendly responses.

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Oh yes!! I too have discovered that problem!! But as I also suffer from learning de and gog, I’m never sure if the word is gog, de or just plain old!!! Discovering I’ve picked up bits of languages without realising it makes things even more confusing!! I suppose it’s good for my 73+ year old brain!!! :grinning:

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I’m feeling all positive again. Loving doing Level 1 so much. I’m finding the short forms are going in quite easily because they’re surrounded by words I know!! Up to Challenge 14. Happy days!

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Happy to hear that you are doing well again! Thanks for sharing that about the short forms…I feel like a lot of people on the forum have mentioned that they had a hard time with those, and so your comment makes me feel less worried about what’s to come. Not that I’m there yet; I’m currently doing Course 2 Gwers 3. My pace has slowed down a little in the intermediate course, because there is so much new stuff packed into each lesson. It’s really fun to expand what I can say with every new one, though, even if it takes a few repetitions to get it all straight :slight_smile:

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Hi Anna
Yes don’t worry - I slowed up quite a lot on Course 2 as well. I think maybe Course 3 is a bit intensive with the short forms, perhaps it’s easier almost going back a step to Level 1 and having them introduced right from the off but in really early (simple) patterns? I’ve certainly had no problems yet and finding most lessons are there with one listen, which has really reassured me how much I do know from the Courses.(I’m sure at some point I will be finding it hard again though so mustn’t get too carried away with myself!)

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Yes, Course 3 seems like a bit of a mountain to climb, whereas with the Level 1 / Level 2 approach, you can to some extent bypass the mountain and eventually get to the same place, with perhaps just a few small hills or bumpy patches in the road. Hopefully, by the end of Level 2, if one then went through Course 3, it would probably seem a lot easier. Will be interesting to see what Level 3 sounds like.

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