I hope they’re helpful:)
What about having some conversations about Welsh literature in skype from time to time? 
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Definitely something I should do 
Oh yeah, I just realised I’ll have to start learning literature analysis words: metaphor, symbolism, allusion… 
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I am shocked. Back in the mists of time when I was in uni, OK, you needed English to get into most decent unis but apart from that, what mattered was really your A levels. I never quoted my O Levels on my CV after uni. I may have put 9 Os, but not marks and subjects. Your later qualifications and experience totally took over in importance.
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I remember reading a book in class, and at home as well, perhaps 5 years ago, and understanding quite a lot of it. ‘I’ve cracked it’ I thought to myself, and then realised I had done a Memrise course with most of the key words in it.
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If I understand your initial post correctly, your choices are between:
- Studying Finnish literature, which may or may not be challenging for you as a native speaker, but you have a real antipathy towards it;
- Teaching yourself Italian literature, which would be challenging, and your heart is just not in it;
- Teaching yourself Welsh literature, which would be challenging, but really excites you.
I think you’ve already made your decision. 
Now, I’m only a beginner in the Welsh language. Your Welsh is almost certainly much better than mine. I know only a little about the IB - we do have it where I live (Australia), and I’ve read a lot about it, but I have no direct experience. And I know nothing about UK university entrance requirements.
So I have no practical advice whatsoever to offer you. (Fortunately, plenty of other people have.)
The reason I’m posting is that I want to echo the shouts of encouragement you’ve received from the many people who have responded to you above. You wrote a VERY impressive initial post.
I was well into your post before it dawned on me that you’re not a native speaker of English. The early mention of Finnish literature threw me a little - I was thinking “that’s a bit of an obscure choice for an IB subject…”, and you’d think that would have given me a hint that you were Finnish. But it didn’t. Your almost perfect English had me completely fooled!
What you achieved in English, you can achieve in Welsh. It’s NOT a crazy idea at all to study Welsh for your IB. You strike me as a very impressive young person, with a natural talent for languages, and I’ve not the slightest doubt you will achieve great things in pretty much whatever you decide to do.
And even if you don’t attain a perfect score in the Welsh exam, and it brings down your overall IB score slightly, I think @sarapeacock makes an excellent point here: [quote=“sarapeacock, post:28, topic:6941”]
I don’t speak with any sort of authority, of course, but I imagine that if I were a university admissions tutor, I would consider someone applying who had the guts, imagination and application to teach themselves Welsh to that standard on top of a whole load of other languages to be an extremely strong position. Don’t undervalue the power of self-motivation; it counts for a huge amount.
[/quote]
Whatever you decide to do, @Novem, I wish you every success.
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i was shocked too… I understand that “the government needs to make sure that everyone has a reached that minimum level” but surely GCSE should be the last thing you look at, if you have no other qualifications? And why do they set the bar so low? So now they are making take a GCSE English exam since I didn’t attend Secondary School in the UK, despite the fact that I had passed my English certificate to come the the Uk to study, I have enough degrees and post-grad degrees that I need, and I actually teach English for a living…
All this to say, while I agree with “study what you like”, make sure that choice has been thought through and all things balanced.
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Thank you so much for your encouragement - it honestly means a lot! 
Okay, I mean, I don’t hate Finnish literature - I hate the course I’m interested in reading Finnish books but I dislike having a time limit for it
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I just wanted to agree with this, @Novem and mention to Matilda that you are not actually Finnish by birth, but Italian!! English is, what, your 3rd or 4th language, after Italian, Finnish and compulsory Swedish, or did you manage to drop that? So Welsh came after all those! If anyone else on here, except @seren and @tatjana could write as well in as many languages, I’d be surprised, especially when they were your age! I believe you are the youngest person on the Forum! I am awed 
:
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Nope, but soon… I’m counting the days. (also hoping SSiSwedish will be a thing at some point so I can finally learn it )
I wouldn’t count Swedish as one of my languages, though, so I’d say English is third (and actually I started learning English before Swedish anyway)
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Going back to the subject of memrise.
For learning a language on its own…useless.
When combined with other things a good aid. As an example there’s a part of old course 3 where @aran says something like “dwi’n addo” (can’t remember exactly). I came across addo on memrise and instantly made the connection.
It helps build a vocabulary but not the context. I use it every day nearly and it helped me form the word ailddatblygu when speaking to someone in Caernarfon last weekend. If i was incorrect i thought so what, but fortunately i think i got it right.
All these tools at our disposal are just aids to learning. The most important things are practise and determination and for me this is where SSIW has helped immensely. I still do SSIW lessons every other day or so. Random ones and the last one’s of every course…i call it fine tuning.
It seems to be working. Hell a first language speaker said I sounded fluent!!! And yes @aran @henddraig @tatjana etc, i shall take that as a bloody big compliment
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Thanks for the correction, @henddraig. I must have missed @Novem’s introductory post, which is not surprising, because I only visit this forum now and then. If Welsh is the fifth language that @Novem has tackled, it makes her achievements even more impressive than I first thought!
I’m very rusty these days in the several languages that I’ve studied over the years, but even at my peak of proficiency, I’d be pleased if I could write in ANY language other than English with the native-like fluency that @Novem has demonstrated here in English.
@Novem, you’ll do fine, whatever you decide. You’re young, you’ve got infinite possibilities ahead of you. Enjoy the ride!
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This has been the case for a long, long time with PGCE - it’s antiquated, there’s no doubt about it - I suspect it was initially put together as a structure to deal with applicants from the UK, where not having either English or Maths (the other one you also need for a PGCE, or so it used to be) would be a real red flag.
I’ve not come across it outside the PGCE thing, though.
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I’ve always liked the word “journal” for that sort of thing. Sounds a bit posher.
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Times have changed, apparently. A niece of ours wanted to do medicine, and it turned out that her medical school of choice required 6 A*s at GCSE level (in addition to goodness knows what at A level of course). And they were quite strict about this requirement.
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You sound incredibly motivated, and I’m really looking forward to meeting you at Bootcamp in April (if slightly scared at how little Welsh I know in comparison).
I went to school that offered both IB and A-Levels, but did A-Levels because my choice of Highers clashed in the school’s timetable.
In the UK, it is mostly independent schools (where you have to pay a fee to attend) that offer IB. If I remember correctly, there used to be restrictions on state schools (free of charge) changing from A-Levels (the exams most 17/18 year olds take in the UK before going to university) to IB at one point in time, although I can’t find any evidence to back this up now.
There aren’t many independent schools in Wales. There also aren’t schools in Wales that offer IB. I suspect this is why Welsh is only available as a Language A (native speaker) option, because there isn’t the demand for Welsh as a Language B option.
Another possible option, if you are dead set on getting a qualification on Welsh, would be to try contacting the exam board WJEC, who offer A-Level Welsh as a Second Language - Link Here. It may be that your school can register as a test centre, and you could sit the exam in Finland. The standard required for second language A-Levels is still pretty high, but not native speaker level.
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My general advice in these situations is do what you want to do. You will learn so much and gain so many skills. Not choosing the easier option is often the best thing. Most of us here, including myself would love to think that you are studying Welsh literature.
However, presumably you will get some sort of grade at the end and this may not reflect the fact that you went for a harder option. Also, there are probably very few Welsh scholars in Finland and it is quite possible, your mark will be lower as your work may be sent to a Welsh university and they won’t understand the Finnish grading system, especially for school-level work (though this may work beneficially too).
The problem with this is that even though your brave choice here should be respected and appreciated for what it is. You may get a lower mark and universities are so competitive these days, they will often take a ‘straight A’ student over someone with a broader and wider range of skills. Why? because whilst an academic would perhaps love to have you as their student, they will be asked by the people with money ‘Why didn’t you take a straight-A student, this person may fail’ taking a non-straight-A student is perceived as a ‘risk’ Academics by themselves would much prefer the rounded student to the exam machine, but their hands are bound these days.
So, the question really is, would you be better off doing something easier, to get a better grade, as that counts a lot these days, until you get to be about 25 anyway. Having said that you will probably be a better 25 year old with knowledge of a subject you are passionate about, than someone who just did what they were expected to do. It isn’t an easy decision.
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Hello
Sorry to be joining the conversation a little late but I have just managed to speak to my niece who did Welsh self taught IB a few years ago. She said that the IB organisation gave them a list of books to choose from, mostly rather old though so hopefully they will have updated their list by now.
My niece was at Atlantic College which is one of the United World Colleges which you may have heard of (There is one in Norway). They are very involved with the IB system and I’m sure they would be happy to advise you about entrance to UK universities with IB qualifications. Their phone number is 01446 799000.
Hope this helps
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Thank you @Jane, @Y_Ddraig_Las and @Anne Evans for your advice
I don’t think it has anything to do with Welsh. Our school doesn’t let us take any self-taught language Bs 
Thank you, I’ll probably look at that if my student counselor doesn’t let me do this. The main reason I’m interested in doing this is that my school will be taking a lot of my time next year. Choosing Welsh as one of my six subjects would give me a lot of time I could spend on Welsh without having to feel guilty for not doing other school things Oh, and it would be pretty cool to study Welsh at native level in an IB school in Finland
I’m in an international school, so the grading system is the same for every country. My work will be sent to someone who either works in one of these schools or is very familiar with them (I’ve been told, not sure though). I wouldn’t be graded unfairly due to a difference in grading systems. But I am aware I wouldn’t get a better grade just because I’m a learner and not a native speaker
Well… all the options I have are difficult for me. I’m never going to get the best possible grade from Finnish, I hate the course and I’m frustrated when I have to take it (possibly causing other subjects to suffer as well?). I’m a native speaker of Italian but I have never written an essay in it. Actually, I don’t think I’ve written anything more than “ciao” (hi), “bene” (well/good) and “buonanotte” (good night) in at least 4 years. Or even read anything in ages.
Honestly, if I don’t get into a university because they won’t accept non-straight-A students, I don’t really care about getting in. I’ve been a straight-A student and I feel happier not being one. If I don’t spend my free time studying I have more time to do things I like (like learn more instead of revising things I already know just so I can make sure I get top marks(thanks SSiW))
Am I trying too hard to rationalise choosing Welsh? 
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I don’t think there is ever a need to rationalise a passion …
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The most important thing is to follow your heart. To do what is right for you. Just make sure it is right.
My previous post was written to make sure your head had considered the options.
If you are sure you want to do this then go for it.
You wil find many who will help you. I’m happy to do so in maths.
What is important is that you’ve considered this fully and as with every student i have taught, my advice remains the same. Consider all options. Do what is right for you. Work at it and you will succeed.
Whatever you decide, i am sure you will get support if you need it.
Follow your dreams. I know you’ll make the right decision.
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