In order for the authority’s Welsh language policy to be inclusive, a specialist service is provided within the county, namely the Immersion Education System. Since being established in its new form in January 2023, there are six strategic settings across the county, which provide a service for latecomers to acquire the Welsh language.
To ensure modern and up-to-date opportunities for learners to practise vocabulary and language patterns in our immersion centres, staff at the Immersion Education System have worked with Anni Llŷn and Animated Technologies to create an innovative virtual village. This project has been developed with Welsh Government revenue grant funding. This new scheme is based on an imaginary village called Aberwla and it incorporates specific language patterns within the language continuum in the Curriculum for Wales. It is a scheme that is relevant to the twenty-first century and reflects modern day Wales. The project enables latecomers to step into Aberwla on a virtual platform to practise language patterns in various locations around the village. On this digital platform, learners are given an opportunity to play games with each other e.g., when filling their basket in the supermarket or by reading instructions and following a shopping list. They also meet different characters and creatures from the usual at Tyddyn Swnllyd Farm and stay at the Glamping Ground for a couple of nights. They can also spend time at the leisure centre, the museum or help Ceri the mechanic at the garage. It is also possible to borrow a drone from the gadget shop to fly above the village to practise command patterns and directions e.g., right and left, forwards and backwards.
Welsh Government officials are very keen for Gwynedd to share this resource nationally and have released funding to facilitate this. The local authority is proud of the opportunity to share the resource for the benefit of learners and to support the Government’s aim in Cymraeg 2050 across Wales. All authorities in Wales are welcome to use the resource by contacting [email protected].
Multimedia resources to reinforce language patterns and vocabulary are valuable, particularly virtual digital resources that appeal to children and young people. This resource is a means to reinforce the skills necessary to enable learners to use the Welsh language in a formal and informal context.
What is becoming clear is the interest learners have in the resource. It is very appealing to latecomers from primary to secondary schools. The virtual element is a means of enabling learners to immerse themselves in the activity and, when they step onto the platform, they are happy to try to communicate through the medium of Welsh. The element of fun and enjoyment attached to the resource certainly has apositive influence on their development and is a means of normalising the Welsh language and making it contemporary in the virtual and digital arena.
Another innovative resource that is worth sharing nationally in the context of Wesh-medium education is the podcast ‘Am filiwn’, which deals with aspects of the world of a teacher that leads to increasing and developing pupils to become Welsh speakers and aims to create a million Welsh speakers. This podcast goes under the skin of immersion education and what happens in our language centres within our Immersion Education System. In the podcast, some learners and their parents share their experiences of attending the Welsh language immersion units in Gwynedd to learn Welsh. In addition, an experienced teacher also talks about the main immersion principles that have proved successful within the Immersion Education System in Gwynedd. This is a valuable resource for students following a teacher training course, for newly qualified teachers or for teachers at the beginning of their career to raise awareness and learn about effective immersion principles and strategies. The Am Filiwn Podcast (ypod.cymru) was developed in a series of podcasts for ITE, Bangor University in collaboration with Initial Teacher Education institutions in Wales, sponsored by Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol.
