Interesting - and all very encouraging!
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I notice BBC Wales advertising BBC Cymru programs sometimes. I donât remember this in the past!
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I can remember once being âaccusedâ of sounding like a gogâŚI took this as a compliment, given that Iâm an Englishman (of mixed drinksâŚ) who has never lived in Wales My acquired âgog-nessâ is all thanks to Aran, Catrin (and maybe a bit to Rownd a Rownd). (Donât think I really sound like a gog, because I donât think I can do that gog âuâ thing thatâs supposed to be a thing anyway).
What is a âWestyâ? _ West Wales? Ceredigion?
âar lafarâ is what SSiW is all about, I would have thought,
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Perhaps the only way is to be at least as obstinate as they are being, and sooner or later they will get the message. But itâs easier said than done, I know.
I have noticed this too and itâs good to see. It would be good to see a bit more Welsh on BBC Wales . For example instead of interviewing a Welsh speaker in English , the interview could be in Welsh but with English subtitles
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Well, I donât like to force the issue. I might just gently ask them - in Welsh, why they donât want to reply in their own language! Do you think they resent a âforeignerâ as they would assume me to be, being a learner, speaking their family language, which they want to keep just for private domestic communication? There must be some reason. It would help if we knew why.
I am certain they donât resent a foreigner learning and speaking Cymraeg! I suspect they are so used to anti-Welsh attitudes that they politely switch to English almost without realising it.
I know a friend couldnât find anyway in Norway willing to speak their own language, but that was because they didnât want to seem.uneducated! Everyone knows most
people in Wales can speak English so it can 't be tha!
I think there needs to be a campaign to encourage first language speakers to use their Welsh with strangers until they find out for sure that the person doesnât speak Welsh. I suspect (from living in Ceredigion amongst Welsh speakers) that a lot of first language speakers use Welsh all the time with friends and people that they know to be other Welsh speakers, but they default to using English with strangers. Iâve been in situations where I have known that someone speaks Welsh and Iâve used only Welsh with them, but theyâve spoken only English to me. Itâs very frustrating.
On one occasion a third person there even spoke up and said to the other person in Welsh - She can speak Welsh you know - and the first person looked at me in total surprise. It seemed that because I was not a person known to him he didnât even register that I was speaking Welsh, but assumed that I was speaking English.
I think encouraging this initial use of Welsh as the default language is really important, especially in areas that traditionally have high numbers of Welsh speakers but now have an influx of English speakers moving in. If they are always addressed in English there is not a lot of incentive for them to actually learn Welsh. If they realise that every conversation is going to start under the assumption that they speak Welsh, and then the conversation has to turn to English to accommodate them, perhaps they would feel more of an interest in learning and becoming truly part of their new community.
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11/07/17
Can anyone explain why the Welsh Governmentâs plan to increase the number of Welsh speakers to 1 million, which featured on BBC Breakfast today, even up here in Scotland, does not seem to consider folk learning with SSiW or any other non-College based method? Or did I miss something? I get the impression the Senedd folk think SSiW is only for those of us outside Wales.
Did you contribute to the Consultation @aran? I know a lot of Forum members have contributed to various surveys and replied to requests for opinions, including the one featured in this thread.
Any idea, anyone, why SSiW etc seem to have been ignored?
EDIT
Just seen Welsh News, seems only teaching children has been considered, yet parents are worried that they canât help the kids because they donât speak Welsh! Mind, I donât recall my folks worrying that they couldnât help me with siubjects they had never taken! However, if they are worried, ways of teaching them need to be included in the plan!
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Just my laymanâs view:
Government incentives tend to gravitate towards government related/type providers. Ok - it is definitely possible to break this mindset as witnessed in say the construction, youthwork and care sectors, etc, but it tends to be a steady long haul.
In the discussion paperâs section on education, on p. 17, there is mention of education for adults:
âObjective:
Improve rates of progression between the different phases of education and the
workplace (early years, primary education, secondary education, post-16 education,
higher education, apprenticeships, the workplace), and ensuring there are
opportunities for adults to learn the language.
How:
Ensure that Welsh-medium courses are a natural choice for people in post-16
or higher education.
Use the findings of longitudinal research to ascertain when specific
interventions are most likely to increase the rate of progression.
Develop innovative opportunities to enable new speakers to become confident
to use Welsh in the workplace, socially and in the home.â (this is where I would place SSiW)
With regard to parents specifically, the section on people lists this as an objective:
âIncrease the rate of transmission within families in order to ensure that future
generations can speak Welsh and use it.â
This is of course high level, but the intent is clearly there
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I totally agree, @louis, I was surprised by the lack of any mention of the internet at all!! I was trying to ask @aran, @Iestyn and anyone else at the âtop endâ of SSiW whether they had been consulted directly, had offered opinions to the request by the Government for opinions and if so, if they had any direct feedback at all!
It seemed, yesterday, that the initiative for schools was all that was being covered, but it is clear that adult education should be involved, so I wondered about SSiW involvement in the planning stage.
I suspect that is because itâs more emotive to talk about school age education. Of course, it wouldnât be like the BBC to only show half a story now would it?! 
Well, have you heard anything about post school on S4C or ITV or Sky or??? Or a Government announcement?
I was being facetious.
I think ITV have agreed to start doing that although I canât find the news about it now!
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It would be a step forward in ânormalisingâ the language if they did
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Why not teach the English more about welsh history. After all these islands were Celtic before the Anglo Saxons arrived and tried to kill off the most beautiful language(CYMRAEG) in the world.
The Welsh people are so polite and very kind.i am proud to say I have welsh blood in my veins .
My family are welsh , though I was raised in England ,I feel very strongly that the welsh language should never die out.
So all the very best to all the wonderful people of Wales,the most wonderful country in the world.
I fear probably we need to say also, why not teach the Welsh more about Welsh history?
I may be wrong but, as I understand it, currently the focus in Welsh schools is mostly on teaching more general British history.
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Yes I was at the airfield the other week there were about four of us speakingWelsh, a fiftth (Welsh speaker) noined the group and apparently purely because he didnât know my face Shwmaed everyone then switched to English.
Happily one speaker there in particular is something of an advocate and instantly went âNo no no - speak Welsh with Leia!â Which I may or may not have had the gumption to do myself - althgh Iâd very likely have carried on in Welsh!
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