I’ve just joined this and am finding a few things a bit frustrating - firstly, there’s no indication anywhere I can find of how long the lessons are, nor does there seem to be any way of stopping a lesson part-way through and going back to it. Has anybody else resolved this question?
I must admit that I’m not much further ahead of you (in spite of this being my third go round. But I’ve found on average, the lessons seem to be approximately 30-34 minutes (the Northern course, anyway). One thing I’ve done, largely because the “online” playback tends to mess up, possibly because of my Internet, is to download each lesson as I get to it. It’s a fairly quick download, and then allows me to see exactly how long each lesson is, and allows me to stop and start, replay sections and so on.
Once downloaded, and “clicked”, on my computer it automatically started playback via iTunes player. If you don’t have that, it might playback on your computer/laptop/tablet default program like Windows player, or what-have-you.
I hope that that helps.
On the Northern couse they tend to be around 35 minutes. I have downloaded all the lessons and then you can stop and re- start them when you want to. I usually listen on my way to work on the bus so have them on my phone and my ipad.
S’mae Oliva?
As the others have said, you need to download the lessons to you computer or mobile device in order to be able to stop a lesson and restart it at the same place at a later date. Once you close your browser, it forgets where you got to, when you are listening purely online. The software you use to play the downloaded file (which is in mp3 format, so you can transfer it to any device that plays such files, like an iPod or other mp3 player), will tell you how long the lesson is and how far you are through it at any point.
Personally, I have the lessons and practices on my iPod for when I am out walking, and burnt onto Cds for playing in the car when I am driving. If you need any assistance with downloading the files, transferring them to a suitable player or device, or anything else, just post back and I (and lots of others) will be able to help you.
Pob lwc efo dy Gymraeg!
Stu
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Thank you all for your helpful comments. It looks like downloading is the way to go - I’ll have to see if I can work out how to get the lessons on to CDs for the car too. I found that worked really well when I was doing Spanish lessons with Michel Thomas CDs. This method is very similar.
Hi Olivia!
You might like to have a look at our How To guide that discusses dowloading vs listening online, etc. It’s here: http://www.saysomethinginwelsh.com/pdf/HowTo01GetStarted.pdf
As to putting them on a cd - it’s usually fairly easy on the computer. On my computer, I just open up the file for the empry cd by clicking on the cd player icon, and drag the lessons from where they are on the computer into the CD box.
Be warned, though. Your car may have the ability to play mp3 files (that’s the form of the lesson soudfiles) if the stereo is farily new and fairly posh. If not, you’ll have to choose the option of saving the mp3s as listenable cd files. You will only get 2 lessons on a CD in that case.
There used to be a thread about making CDs on the old forum, but I’ve lost the link. Can anyone else help?
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After downloading the lessons and working throught the full lesson I use Audacity (a free sound editing programme) to edit out all the English and music and one of the voices.
I leave the same amount of time after each Welsh phrase as the phrase itself to give me a chance to repeat out loud what I just heard. This reduces the length of the lesson to approx.1/3rd - and its all Welsh - so I can get a lot of repetition.
Hi Huw - I appreciate you offering to share this with people, which is very kind of you 
One slight problem - what you’re building here is sort of a half-way house between a lesson and a listening exercise - I’d strongly recommend that you focus on the lessons and (particularly from Level 1 onwards) the scripted listening exercises, which cover everything you’ve done far, far faster than listening/echoing an entire lesson
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