Daily ‘live’ lessons and other initiatives
enable adults to learn Welsh at home
The National Centre for Learning Welsh has responded to the challenges posed by the coronavirus lockdown with a raft of initiatives to enable adults to continue learning and practising the Welsh language while at home.
Daily Welsh lessons, live-streamed on the Centre’s Facebook page, online courses, digital learning resources and distance learning are among the developments to support the Centre’s learners, which number some 13,000 adults across Wales.
The daily, 10-minute Welsh lessons, which are live-streamed Monday-Friday at 3pm on the Centre’s Facebook page, introduce basic vocabulary and language patterns and tips on pronunciation. The lessons have proved popular, with learners from as far afield as Dubai and Argentina tuning in, along with viewers in Wales.
Community-based courses, which started last September and in January this year, have continued, with Welsh tutors now using remote conferencing platforms such as Zoom and Skype to teach their students.
New online video clips are being introduced, to complement the 1,500 video, audio and interactive learning resources already available on the Centre’s website, learnwelsh.cymru
A range of online short courses, introducing conversational Welsh, are also available, while plans are underway to introduce weekly Welsh ‘taster’ sessions for parents of young children, which will also be live-streamed on Facebook.
Efa Gruffudd Jones, Chief Executive of the National Centre for Learning Welsh, said: “Since taking responsibility for the Learn Welsh sector in 2016, developing digital learning resources has been a priority, in order to give learners flexibility and choice when it comes to learning the language. With such firm foundations in place, we’ve been able to fast-track new resources to offer plenty of options for adults to learn and practise at home, whether they’re already following a course with us or learning anew.
“Our community courses have also been able to continue, largely as normal, thanks to remote conferencing technology, and I would like to pay tribute to our course providers and tutors who have adapted quickly to using this technology.
“Above all, we’re delighted to be able to support our learners – with both their learning and from a wellbeing point of view, providing routine, normality and social support during these unprecedented circumstances.”
Ends
- Funded by Welsh Government and hosted by University of Wales Trinity Saint David, the National Centre for Learning Welsh is responsible for all aspects of the Learn Welsh sector.
- The Centre works with a network of 11 course providers, which deliver courses on its behalf across Wales.
- In 2018-2019, 13,260 unique learners followed Learn Welsh courses, an increase of 5% when compared to 2017-2018. For more information on the Centre’s data, click here.
