Cymraeg Da

Gruffudd, Heini (2000) Cymraeg Da: Gramadeg Cyfoes Ac Ymarferion [‘good Welsh: a modern grammar and exercises’; a.k.a. A Welsh Grammar For Learners]. Talybont: Y Lolfa, ISBN 0-86243-503-X, £12.50 p/b.

FEATURES: Published March 2000, 312pp, 215×201mm. IN WELSH. Accompanied by diskette of examples, and optional 144pp workbook (below).

WORKBOOK: Gruffudd, Heini (2000) Cymraeg Da: Ymarferion. Talybont: Y Lolfa, ISBN 0-86243-533-1, £2.95 p/b.
“A collection of 2,000 graded language exercises for Learners of the Welsh language comprising revision sections on verbs and adverbs, prepositions and adjectives, the definite article, nouns and pronouns, numbers and clauses, together with answers, to be used in conjunction with A Welsh Grammar for Learners.”

ASSESSMENT: Since I haven’t got a copy of this book, Hazel Davey has kindly provided the following assessment. Diolch Hazel!

This book is an excellent grammar workbook for fairly competent Welsh learners. The book is organised in units and each unit is further subdivided into steps Each step has an explanation of a grammatical concept, followed by a variety of written and oral exercises.

As the grammatical explanations are given in Welsh, the book will not be of much use to people who are beginning to learn Welsh, but the grammar is explained simply without overuse of technical jargon. Each concept is reinforced with a number of example sentences, and the book also comes with a disk of examples. A further workbook of exercises is available separately.

While, on the whole it is a very good book and good value for money, I have the following criticisms:

• There are no answers to the exercises printed in the book, some or all of these may be on the disk but that is not so convenient.
• The disk requires Internet Explorer 5 to run but doesn’t really offer anything over exercises printed in a book. That is, it isn’t interactive, merely a list of sentences to translate or gaps to fill and a button to press for the answers which you have to manually check.
• From the adult learner’s point of view some of the subject matter seems a bit odd. The book has primarily been written for school children studying for exams and this leads to many of the examples being targetted at this group, e.g. the disco, misuse of drugs etc.

To avoid ending on a negative note, a few of the features that I really liked include:

• the section on prepositions which illustrates the multiple uses of each preposition and gives a list of associated verbs and phrases;
• the excellent index and contents that mean that the workbook is also a useful reference book;
• the cartoons and other illustrations that lighten the text and can often help you to remember things;
• the clear layout, concise descriptions and summary/revision sections that all make the book nicer to use.

In short, one of the best grammar books that I’ve seen for people who hate grammar!!

© 2000 Hazel Davey

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: http://www.ylolfa.com/awduron/heini-gruffudd.htm

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