I’ve managed to work my way through to the end of the main course 1 lessons and I’m now wondering what sort of proficiency I need to gain before I consider moving on to the vocab units. The first 23 lessons of the course went better than I expected and for the most part I would only ever have to repeat a troublesome lesson once (or maybe once and a half by doing small troublesome sections 3/4 times). However lesson 24 was a bit more difficult as I was struggling a bit with the unlucky triad of new verbs, new structures and longer sentences which weren’t quite as troublesome for me in the earlier lessons. I repeated the lesson 3 times until I felt more comfortable with its content, however lesson 25 then took me back to where I was 3 lessons previous because the random nature of the questions threw me off a little!
I fully intend to repeat 25 again however I posted as I wondered just quite how good I need to be to move on, Iestyn mentioned that a pass with flying colours would be 100% success in lesson 25 however I have a feeling that may take me about 10 repeats! Does course 2 carry on where 1 left off or does it not tend to use course 1 material? Also in relation to the fact that I know I shouldn’t really be looking at 100% accuracy all the time, as even though I wasn’t happy with lesson 25 first time around (I probably got 70% of the questions right) most of my mistakes were on long sentences where I either got the start wrong by saying something like “I need to” where “I have to” was required or “he did” instead of “he has”, getting one verb wrong in a long sentence or the occasional mix up between sut and beth during brain wracking sections. What level is considered nearly there and what’s considered wrong?
Sorry if I’ve brought about too much un-needed negativity in one go And I should of course finish by saying thanks to Iestyn and Cat (plus everyone else involved) for a brilliant course which has helped me develop Welsh in leaps and bounds!
Don’t worry about getting 100%. If you’re getting about 70-80% right, you’re doing fine and you’re more than ready to move onto the vocab lessons. Also, congratulations on being a Welsh speaker. No, really. In what I’d imagine is around two months, you’ve come farther than most people reach in two years, and I guarantee your Welsh is better than my French was after five years in high school. So please stop beating yourself up and let yourself be proud of how far you’ve come.
In answer to your other question, course 2 uses patterns and vocabulary from course 1, but not from the vocab lessons (they were written after they started doing course 2). Course 2 doesn’t have much practice for the course 1 content, however, so you’ll want to occasionally do Vocab 10 again to keep it all fresh.
Incidentally, while you’re doing course 2, you might want to take a look at the new Level 1 - there’s a lot of stuff in there that’ll be quite new to you, and while the southern version isn’t done yet, there’s enough to be getting on with for now.
Shwmae Joel
Just to add to Chris’ excellent advice, there are daily practices available for course 1, both for listening and speaking. They are 5 minutes long each and in the style of lesson 25 - totally random!
With the practice sessions, there’s no pressure to get all of them correct. The idea is that over time you will do these practices and get many of them right straight away. Using the pause button isn’t recommended for these either. Just let them wash over you, get as many right as you can, and move on. Tomorrow will be a different session with different phrases in a different order! They’re only intended to help you keep the course 1 material fresh in mind while you’re concentrating on getting through the course 1 vocab units, and subsequently, course 2. Also, there’s only 5 practices a week, and each week they will change - so you will rarely get the same practice twice (and if you notice that you do, then you KNOW you’re doing good! To be fair I wouldn’t know though!!)
Da iawn ti for completing course 1, and pob lwc with the rest of the course!
Iestyn mentioned that a pass with flying colours would be 100% success in lesson 25
We may need to do some intro/outro re-recording, then! If you’re hitting 70% on Lesson 25, you are more than ready to move on. I’d recommend revisiting 25 once a fortnight for a couple of months, and then once every two or three months from then on.
Meanwhile, throw yourself into the vocabs just for fun, on a ‘gallop through them’ basis - don’t worry about mistakes at all, because they’re not structured as well as the main course, so they’re really just to give you a headstart on stuff you’re most likely to need in Bootcamp - since you’re not on the verge of a Bootcamp, they’re not all that important.
Good luck with Course 2, and with realising that you really have turned into a Welsh speaker…
Sounds like you’re doing brilliantly, Joel! I remember that lesson 25 - tough! As Aran’s said, you don’t need to do the vocab - you could just press ahead to course 2. I have to say, though, I did find them really good fun and very useful. But I suppose there’s no harm in going on to Course 2 and going back to do the vocab later on (or interspersing with Course 2?)
I would suggest doing what is available in the new Level 1 before doing the Vocabs. I was on Vocab 3 when they appeared and my curiosity led to me divert my attention. After doing them, I had to do a refresh of the last few C1 lessons. But they and the Vocabs were much easier to do. The new Lessons will give you a much better understanding of the language.
Thanks for the advice everyone! I think I will probably have a go at the vocab units as I’m quite keen to be able to fit things like numbers and days of the week into what I’ve learnt, as for level 1 I’ll have to have a think about whether I have a crack at them before course 2 or if I wait until a few more are up and perhaps do it inbetween course 2 and 3. And to Chris I know that feeling too, it’s only been 3 years yet I’ve still managed to regrettably forget what I did manage to learn in GCSE Spanish!
