Helo! Progress updates (and probably questions!)

Unfortunately, that only narrows it down to about 20,000 possible matches…:wink:

Hope you had a good day! :sunny:

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I had a lovely day, beautiful weather (and some great cider!). I went to see the crowning ceremony, which was certainly an experience!

I finished Challenge 25 on the way home today, perfect timing as I’m off on holiday tomorrow for a week and a half, so will take a break from Welsh (keeping with 5 minutes listening though of course!) and start Level 2 on my return. Maybe by the 2016 Eisteddfod I’ll be able to keep up with Tom’s family conversing at speed…

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Da iawn!

At this rate … you will. :slight_smile:

I’m not sure, I swear they speak much faster than ordinary people!

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Siarad yn arafach, plis.(remember?) This should work. :slight_smile:

Yeah, just got to be braver I think. It doesn’t help that they’re not necessarily talking to me, just at the dinner table for example. 9 Welsh speakers and I all went out for Sunday lunch when I was in North Wales the other week, at least three different conversations, all in Cymraeg, happening at the same time, usually about people I didn’t know. Would have been hard to follow in English I think!

(Making excuses now…)

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Surprise them and YOU start the conversation. What about that? :slight_smile:

This is very true and very important - we forgive ourselves for not understanding stuff in English very easily, because we know sometimes you just don’t, for a load of reasons - but any ‘failure’ to understand in Welsh gets chalked down to yourself, which is just plain wrong :sunny:

So yes, as Tatjana said, at this rate… :star2:

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Starting Level 2 tomorrow! Thought about trying Challenge 1 now, but at half 10 my brain’s shut down for the day.

I already know the opening song is going to drive me crazy, my boyfriend sings it to me almost every time I make him coffee and I already have the chorus stuck in my head on a semi-permanent basis…

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Apologies in advance! If it’s any consolation, we suffer the same over here… :sunny:

Who sings? YOU? :slight_smile: This I would but like to hear! :slight_smile:

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Level 2 challenge 2. Well, not struggled that much since the start! So many new complicated phrases to learn in half an hour, I’m definitely repeating that one, no matter what Aran says!

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Do bear in mind that you’re not meant to ‘learn’ all the phrases - they’re about giving your brain exposure to different constructions. If you’re trying to ‘get’ all the new stuff, you’re going to make life very tough for yourself… :scream: :sunny:

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Yah, @RachelH you’ll be like me, and you don’t want that, believe me! :frowning: One of my kind is enough for SSi, it’s no need for more …

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Surely I need to learn them to use them in sentences… I was literally in my car like “what is happening”…

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You do, yes - but don’t confuse that learning process with your conscious control of individual sentences.

The most important elements in each lesson are the new items that are produced - if you find that you can’t remember them in the first set of sentences where they’re introduced to you, then that’s worth focusing on.

But the wide and challenging range of ways in which previous stuff gets re-presented to you is not on your ‘must learn this’ radar - it’s just helping give your brain a headstart on figuring stuff out when you start putting it into live conversations.

When you push on in this messy way, and get yourself into conversations, you will (in due course) find that the collection of things that you’re most likely to need to say will become easy for you comparatively quickly. If you focus on ‘getting stuff right’, you’ll create a sense of failure and stagnation that will make it all much tougher for you.

So, in summary, I strongly recommend that you push on through to the end of Level 2 without repeating, and then if you still feel the itch, come back and re-visit Challenge 2 at that stage (and let us know how it feels for you by then!)… :sunny:

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Okay, so I tried Challenge 3 without repeating, but got barely 5 minutes in before I was completely blank, unable to recall any part of the sentence. For my own peace of mind then I went back to Challenge 2 (I know, I know, but it’s too ingrained in me to change now!) but was still blank for chunks of that too! I feel like whenever something is used but not introduced (‘What are you (pl) going to do yourself?’ and ‘Did you have a good time yourself?’ from Challenge 2 spring to mind) I’m just not picking it up. My hearing of sounds isn’t very good, so unless it’s broken down slowly I really struggle to pick out the consonant and vowel sounds that make up the word initially and so they just don’t go in. Wasn’t even able to complete Challenge 2 today, probably the mindset I’m in, but if I can’t even say half the sentence I start to get frustrated, and then I can’t remember even the easier stuff and get more frustrated and so on in a vicious cycle.

Going back to my notebook and writing down all the things I’ve heard so far, to try to match up what I’m saying with what I should be saying, and hoping that will help.

Everybody has off days - in every field of human endeavour. Ask people who do strength training, for example - some days they just feel stronger than others. Life is ebb and flow.

So when you have a day like that, put it all down, and come back to it the next day.

If it’s still a problem the next day, focus on what you feel when you hear the Welsh (NOT on whether or not you say it yourself in time). If you recognise it (by which I don’t mean understand, just recognise that it’s familiar) then you’re good to carry on.

If none of it sounds like anything you’ve ever heard before, then you probably do need to have another go at some of the earlier ones :sunny:

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I usually recognise what I hear, but it just doesn’t seem to come out when I try to say it.

Writing out things yesterday, I’ve just realised I’ve been saying “ychydig” wrong this whole time, I’ve definitely been adding a “rh” to the start…

I’ll try Gwers 3 again today, hope it was just an off day like you say :slight_smile:

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In that case, try to be as Zen about it as possible - if you’re recognising it, your brain is forming the necessary structures for memory, and you will reach the point where your production kicks in… :sunny:

And do NOT worry about minor errors - they will all iron themselves out through usage in due course, I promise :sunny:

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