Excited to be saying something in Welsh

Welsh
#1

Hello,

I have been trying to say something in Welsh for 3 weeks now and I’ve been to 3 online Q&A/Level 1 classes, so I thought I would say hello here too.

I have learned other languages before and the only way I ever got good was by listening to and talking with people in the target language, so I am intrigued and excited by this method. I am pretty fearless about diving in, going fast and making mistakes! (I have burned through a few driving instructors that way, but that’s another story!) So far my MO is to start every week with the challenge and exercises recommended in the email from @aran and then keep going with more challenges if I have time. I do it whilst I’m washing up, gardening etc, so I don’t use the pause button at all. However, I do repeat the lessons but not too often. (In week 1, I did challenges 1 and 2, then in week 2, I did challenges 2, 3 and 4 and this week I am having a mega week with challenges 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 already!) I make a lot of mistakes and mix-ups, but I usually manage to jabber something out in time. Once in a while I am struck completely mute or can’t do the end of the sentence – I assume that’s OK and I don’t need to start taking my hands out of the water/soil to hit pause?

My experiences of learning other languages was often centred about trying to persuade people that they don’t need to switch to English for me means that I also have a good ‘I totally understand what you’re saying’ pretend face, which tripped me up in the online class when someone started speaking Welsh to me. (I had no idea what they were saying, but we cleared it up quite quickly.)

I have lots of quite small motivations for learning Welsh rather than one big one, so I hope that having fun with it will be enough to keep my intention to practice.

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I’m really enjoying it and I particularly appreciate hearing the voices in the challenges telling me how brilliantly I’m doing even if I’m not!

Thank you and diolch – I’ll let you know how I get on!

Cathy

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#2

Sounds like you’re doing fine to me, Cathy :slight_smile: . Mistakes and mix-ups are par for the course - they’ll iron themselves out as you progress, and as for the pause button, some need it more than others so if you’re happy not using it, no problem!

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#3

Thank you for the reassurance! :smile:

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#4

Sounds as though you’re off to a fantastic start, Cathy, and you’ve got exactly the right attitude, so I’m sure you’re going to do brilliantly :star: :star2:

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#5

Thank you, I live for gold stars so I feel motivated to keep going.

I did a major housework blitz yesterday and pushed through to Challenge 12, by which point it was WAY too hard for me. (Looking at the vocab list afterwards, I was hearing the word ‘roedd’ as something like ‘bode’. As ‘r’ is nowhere near ‘b’ I can only assume that this was some sort of auditory hallucination!) I’ve gone a back a few lessons now but I did my sentences out loud to no-one in particular this morning so it’s two steps forward, one and a half back…

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#6

Da iawn Cathy
It was nice to chat with you in the q&a, looking forward to seeing and chatting with you again.
Pob lwc
Ailéin

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#7

Diolch Ailéin. It was lovely to meet you too – see you again soon, I hope!

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#8

I do like fellow gold star hunters… :wink:

12, 13 and 14 are all far too hard - my fault, badly written - blame me and press on through as quickly as possible, don’t worry if you feel as though you’re getting almost everything wrong - from 15 onwards it starts to settle down again, and you’ll get the bits you’ve missed from the subsequent spaced repetition… :slight_smile:

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#9

That is good to know, thank you. I’ll try not to worry about them too much, then…

#10

wow I am so glad to find this thread- I’ve just done lesson 13 for the second time and wanted to cry! But I know now I’ll need some deep breathing exercises for lesson 14 then my headache should disappear with lesson 15 :grin: so grateful to read Aran’s words of reassurance here!!

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#11

Really honestly worth pushing past these as quickly as possible, and blaming me - sorry! :smiley:

#12

It really does get easier again!

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#13

yes- (aside from the “dwedodd” problem I have) I must say I’ve been enjoying the later lessons and have got through them quicker! :grinning:

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#14

Excellent, delighted to hear that! :star2:

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