Croeso! Welcome to 1 sentence in Welsh - how is it going for you?

I would love to have access to some live Welsh but living in Australia, that is proving a bit difficult and I am technologically challenged. Could anyone give me a simple way to access some children’s Welsh language programmes on the web. I would also appreciate being able to buy some children’s’ books in Welsh - preferably second hand. Is there such a thing? (I have financial limitations). Thanks for any help and responses in advance. diolch yn fawr. Sarah.

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Hi, my name’s Steve and I’m new to Say something in welsh, I’ve been using Duolingo for 223 days but seemed to stop taking information in as I’ve been trying 4 lessons per day and other people have suggested to cut back using duolingo and try SSIW as well, I’ve actually enjoyed learning with SSIW because it’s encouraging me to actually speak Welsh instead of just reading, I’m interested to find out how other members use SSIW (ie how long they do a lesson before moving on to the next, how many time a week they practice etc), many thanks, steve

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Hi, my name is Rachel, My great grand parents were Welsh and I never knew them ,so I thought, what better way to honor them than for me to learn Welsh. I’ve been using Duolingo for about 4 months now and at times get frustrated as I’ve never had a natural ability for languages and I have to remind myself that languages take time to learn and maybe I’m being too hard on myself. The saysomething lesson I think will help me a lot as its says the words very clear and slow as pronunciation is something I’m struggling with. I think I need to practice the alphabet a lot more.

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Hi @rachel

I started with Duo Lingo too and hopped on to SSIW - it was like having rockets boosters strapped on!

Rich :slight_smile:

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Hi Steve,
Croeso i SSiW. I’d say the two compliment each other well. Like msny others learning with SSiW I was learning withb Duo Lingo first. I have to say the acceleration to my learning has been significant since commencing on my SSiW journey last June. I don’t think you should worry about hitting learning walls every so often. We all do it but the important thing is to realise learning needs to be enjoyable to work. Making mistakes, revising previous learning and pausing is all part of it. SSiW works on the well founded theory that practice and repitition makes perfect. You didn’t learn your mam iaith without doing that so don’t expect to be perfect Yn Gymraeg. Just renember though, the Welsh speaking populous is small but fervent in its desire to encourage and support learners. Don’t ever be disheartened. If I can learn the language , you can.

Gareth

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Dw’in meddyl bo dwi wedi dysgu llawer y siarad cymraeg mewn amser bir - diolch!

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I’m on 156 days of duo lingo and I’m the same, I don’t feel like I can actually speak it. I love how clear the sentences are on SSIW. I’m getting tongue tied but early days :smiley: I will just keeping going over it again and again until it eventually goes in :crazy_face:

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I’ve just started SSiW and enjoying actually trying to Say something in Welsh lol

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Ooohh just seen that you shouldn’t keep going over and practising old ones. :roll_eyes:

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Hi Rich
I’m loving this, I’m actually speaking Welsh :smiley:

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I’ve read that when practicing the lessons, that when you get through about 80% of the lesson without using the pause button then you can move on to the next lesson

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im struggling more with remembering what is said in English!:roll_eyes:

When he Says a long sentence in English, I’ll pause, then say the sentence about 3 or 4 times to myself, even if it means breaking the sentence down then I’ll try and say it in welsh, I even count the words on my fingers :rofl:

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The advice has changed with evidence now. As long as you say anything in the gaps, its OK to move on. Also that its ok to respond to what you remember the sentence roughly being. Its all practice and the same stuff will be revised later in the course. Dal ati/keep at it :grin:

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That’s brilliant, thank you for the advice

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I’ve just started my day 1 challenge today and I can get to about 18 minutes within pausing then my brain goes to mush. I’m thinking I have a week to learn this without pausing and then ill move on to challenge 2, although so tempted to have a sneaky listen to number 2 :blush:

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Hi Gareth
not sure if you sent me a message or not cause im rubbish at forums. But I didn’t want to appear rude if you had. So hello :slight_smile: I started Monday and ive completed challenge 1 now no pauses and ive started challenge 2 but having to pause from about half way through at every sentence . I still feel really proud of myself though and I cant actually believe that im doing it.

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Shwmae Rachael a croeso!
I don’t think I deliberately messaged you but I see that I replied to StephenElliot and it may have been in your thread on the Forum at the time too. The forum is a bit messy so it’s easy to post in the wrong place. Anyway, it’s great to hear you are doing so well. I’m on my 5th week of Lefel 2 and I started in June last year. I’ve paused a couple of times along the way too. I’m really enjoying the course. I took the plunge and joined the Penwythnos Dysgwrs trip to Caernarfon last month and absolutely loved it. My brain was ready to melt by the time I’d spent a whole weekend conducted almost entirely yn Gymraeg. Even though it took me about 7 hours to drive up to the NW of Wales from my home in Hampshire I was so enthused that I’ve booked a weekend in Pontypwl with Coleg Gwent and also managed to get onto the June Bwtcamp. I’m looking forwards to bothe with excitement and trepidation. I’m also hoping that I can catch up with the wonderful people I met in Carnarfon in teh near future too.
Maybe our paths will cross one day too.
Hwyl,
Gareth

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Helo and thanks for the welcome! I’m right at the beginning, having just got to day 5, but I’m really enjoying it so far and I’ve been surprised at how much the sentence I’ve been learning has stuck in my mind. I came across this site when doing an internet search about whether Duolingo is actually any good for learning Cymraig and it’s been a great find. (I’m still doing both, which is an interesting comparison.) I took a while to decide whether to go for North or South, and eventually decided on South as that’s the area of Cymru that’s geographically closest to me, but I’m wondering how different they are and how easy or otherwise it will be to learn North as well? I haven’t tried switching yet as I don’t want to confuse myself early on. Anyway, thanks for the support and I will definitely be recommending SSi. Ruth

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Welcome Ruth :slight_smile:
To be honest, the differences aren’t as big as they’re imagined to be. It’s not as if the whole language changes once you pass Machynlleth!
There are a few constructions that are different and there are some words that have N & S equivalents, but mostly it’s the same for both, albeit with slightly different pronounciations on some vowel sounds.

Generally, it’s not a huge task to learn N once you’ve got a good handle on S (or vice-versa!), and it’s not a bad thing either - you don’t get thrown by a northern way of saying things if you’ve heard it before, even if you yourself stick to using southern ways of saying them. Indeed, once they’ve completed the whole course, quite a few SSiWers here have gone back to do the course again in whichever version they didn’t do first!

Besides, once you start using Welsh “in the wild”, you’ll naturally come across northern words and constructions anyway, so you’ll pick up a fair bit that way :slight_smile:

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