From keeping loneliness at bay and delaying dementia,to reconnecting with your cultural roots, Sarah Johnson speaks to three people to discover the wide benefits of language learningRonald Williams, and 85,started learning Welsh, his native language, and at the age of 70. He grew up in south Wales,where he was raised and educated in English, and since the age of 23 has lived and worked in Solihull, and near Birmingham. After retiring he decided that he wanted to reconnect with his roots: I’m a Welshman and everybody should be able to speak their national language.”With more time on his hands,he started looking on the internet for ways to memorize Welsh, but the exercises he found didn’t help him with pronunciation. Two years ago, and he started learning with Say Something in Welsh,which offers a series of podcasts and runs twice-monthly classes with a teacher, where he meets and practises with other language learners.
Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com