A nurse from Bulgaria is so passionate about her adopted homeland after settling in Flintshire that she and her family are learning Welsh.
Tanya Trotter has signed up for a ground-breaking new course has been by the Coleg Harlech Workers’ Educational Association at the National Eisteddfod in Wrexham.
From September, Coleg Harlech will be running the Cymraeg i’r Teulu (Welsh for the Family) courses across North and Mid-Wales, working in conjunction with the North and Mid Wales Welsh for Adults Centre.
Coleg Harlech specialises in providing courses tailored to the needs of adults in communities and workplaces across North and Mid Wales.
They run evening and day classes across North and Mid Wales and residential courses at their college in the historic castle town of Harlech.
Coleg Harlech Principal Trefor Owen said: “Cymraeg i’r Teulu is a very exciting and innovative course which will do what it says on the tin, help families to learn Welsh and do so in a way that is relaxing and enjoyable.
“Securing this contract was a major milestone in the history of our organisation and one of our priorities will be to ensure that the courses are available in deprived areas and in the rural areas of North and Mid Wales.”
Tanya, 47, said: “Living in Wales, I felt it was good for us to learn more about Wales, and the language and everything related to the country. It was a combined decision.
The Welsh for the Family course provided her with the “perfect opportunity” to learn the language while continuing her job, she said.
And she is already reaping the benefits of her new ability to speak in Welsh at work.
“There are Welsh speaking patients and sometimes they are excited if I say something in Welsh to them. It’s good. It’s fun,” she said.
“It helps me to get to know them better. I can already see benefits.”
The course, delivered as a two-hour weekly session, allowed Tanya and Kyle, a senior support worker with Clwyd Alyn Housing Association, to learn the language in the same way that Iwan has done at school.
“With Iwan we try to do commands such as ‘Hurry up’ and ‘ Go to bed’ and have simple conversations,” said Tanya who plans to continue to improve her Welsh by advancing to the second year of Welsh for the Family.
Tanya’s tutor Meinir Tomos Jones, who is also Coleg Harlech’s Welsh for Adults coordinator, said her student was making excellent progress.
“To give her son the gift of bilingualism through a Welsh medium education shows a great deal of insight,” said Meinir, formerly a Welsh language teacher at Ysgol Dinas Bran, Llangollen.
The Welsh for the Family course is aimed at adult beginners which focuses on the fun element of learning.
Coleg Harlech is also offering Cymraeg o’r Crud (Welsh from the Cradle) courses w in partnership with Welsh language project TWF for parents and babies, and Hwyl i’r Teulu, a short taster course for parents of young children.
Meinir added: “The new provision will encourage progression among learners learning for family reasons to more advanced Welsh courses delivered by other providers.
“To ensure consistency of delivery across Flintshire, Wrexham, Conwy, Denbighshire, Gwynedd, Powys and Ynys Mon, Coleg Harlech we are recruiting and training 12 new part-time tutors who will start work in September.
“We have already started running Cymraeg o’r Crud – a short course of 10 sessions of 90 minutes each in a relaxed environment – at Gwersyllt and Rhosllanerchrugog.”
Both Cymraeg o’r Crud and Hwyl i’r Teulu, delivered in partnership with primary schools, are taster courses to encourage progression to the mainstream Welsh for the Family course.
Former Welsh Assembly Member Helen Mary Jones, herself a Welsh learner, launched the new initiative at the National Eisteddfod.
It heralded a week of activities at the Coleg Harlech stand, including entertainment from folk group Pen Tennyn, family activities by actif247 and characters such as Sam Tân (Fireman Sam) from an S4C’s children’s channel, Cyw.
The packed programme during the festival week includes Cymraeg o’r Crud taster sessions, Welsh for the Family craft activities, language sessions with health and well-being activities, and nordic walking on the Eisteddfod field.
Meinir also teaches the language to 46-year-old freelance copywriter David Grieve at Ysgol Nannerch where his children Frazer, 11, and Carys, 8, are pupils.
David, from Nannerch, began his Welsh for the Family evening course last September and now chats in Welsh with his children and wife Liz at home.
“I thoroughly enjoy the way the course is delivered – it’s very informal and relaxed,” said David.
“We have learned the same sort of things as children learn and it’s very nice to practise with them and introduce Welsh into our conversations.”
Meinir said David, one of 11 learners at Nannerch, seemed to have “thrived” on the course and had taken advantage of every opportunity to practise his Welsh through a programme of informal activities, including a visit to GreenWood Forest Park at Y Felinheli, that enables learners and their families to meet and chat in Welsh.
David admits that he’s “not a natural” when it comes to learning Welsh but he is keen to continue to develop his language skills.
He and daughter Carys aim to attend the Eisteddfod launch which, says Meinir, will be a celebration of securing the contract for the full Welsh for the Family provision across North Wales as well as North Powys.
“It’s quite a milestone for us and we are very, very proud of what we have achieved,” she said.
