Leaving Cert Irish - Doing Foundation with no other Language.

Hey and thanks for looking at this thread.

I've just started the Leaving Cert again, I'm repeating the year due to a change of mind with regards my course. Last year, and for a number of years before, I was intent on doing Architecture in DIT; so Irish or any other Language was not a requirement. I decided to take up, or take down I should say, Foundation Level Irish. I even did Foundation Irish for my Junior Cert because I was so sure I would do Architecture in DIT. And as you probably know there is no other language requirement bar English to get into DIT.

But I've changed my mind, and now I'm royally screwed. I've decided I want to do Theoretical Physics in Trinity College. So now I've a year to do Irish, or another Language.

This may not sound like a huge problem, but I've literally not done Irish for years, basically since First Year. So I don't know any Irish, or anything about it.

I now need an Ordinary D3, and I don't know how to go about getting it. My school wants to put me straight into an ordinary Irish class, but if I go in I'll be completely lost, as I dont know any Irish.

Can anybody give me some advice on learning the basics, all I need is a D3 in ordinary, so it can't be terribly hard can it? Or would it be easier to take up German or French say? Any tips that you can give me will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

Ricky91t

Iv just gone into leaving and iv decided to drop down to pass Irish as I'm not to bothered about it and honours was a bit tough,I personally find honours a bit tough as you have to read a novel etc. but pass is very easy to pick up(for me anyway)I think honours French was easier than honours Irish but I don't know about pass,best thing to do is stick with Irish now and do a lot of study every night,maybe ask a the Teacher is they will do grinds of whatever they are called on weekends,All in all good luck

Piste

Irish is a difficult language to master- even if you have 8 years of primary school Irish and you remember that.

I'd say your best bet would be do ordinary level French or Spanish (two easiest languages in my opinion) and drop Irish altogether.


With hard work I'd say a D3 in French or Spanish would be doable.

liverpool lad

personally i would give the irish a go. The reading comprehensions aren't difficult at ordinary level (well maybe I'm being biased as I did Honours and got an A1 but....) with a good bit of work you could get your D3 you need. The nore difficult part would probally be paper two with the stories and poetry but revise wise is very good and covers all aspects of the course. I did german and absolutely hated it.
hope it was off help

gaybitch

A good Irish grind would be great, and if you could book yourself into any Easter Gaeltacht, that'd be a great help for the oral as well. As long as you get the verb tenses down - which a good grammar book or even a glance card could help you with - you've got the ball rolling.

If you're repeating in a normal school, ask your ordinary Irish teacher about them devoting a bit of time towards bringing you up to the standard of the rest of the class.

It sounds stupid, but even if you don't understand anything, try to watch TG4 and RNG, as you'll pick up a feel for pronounciation, rhythm and the general sound of the language.

Concentrate mostly on P1, the aural and the oral, as I've heard poems and stories aren't as focused on in Ordinary level.

Keep positive, and don't be afraid to ask for help from anybody! Good luck, you can do it - Irish really isn't as hard as people try to make it sound. You'll probably end up loving it - a D3 is certainly achievable.

blue-army

gaybitch wrote: »

Concentrate mostly on P1, the aural and the oral, as I've heard poems and stories aren't as focused on in Ordinary level.

yep...It only counts for 20%!

I got 100% in Irish paper 2 but only got a B2 in the end.:(


Anyway, pass Irish is do-able.

The 2 reading comprehensions are worth 100 marks. With a bit of practice you could get 80marks out of 100. You don't need to understand anything. Just basicaly match the question to something similar in the passage. Very little, if any, manipulation is needed.

The essays are fairly general. Learn a few of the basics. Past tense will be enough. Sport, Summer Holidays....only need to be a page or so long for full marks.

Letters are fairly easy aswell. You get a decent amount of marks for the layout. Ie. address, date, A Seán, .... and Slan agus beannacht....
They are nearly always about getting a summer job, or your writing a letter home to parents from France or Spain...

Dont be put off by learning the tenses. Thats the bit I hated. I never understood how to put the proper endings in future and present tenses...

Just learn the basic ones in the 3 tenses...eg I went, I stayed, I bought etc...

Paper 2 is easy enough tbh...
You don't need to do all of the stories...There's a huge choice...
I never fully understood the questions in the stories or poetry, but I just wrote loads on everything...in simple Irish, basically telling the story again...Spelling and grammer doesnt matter in paper 2.
You'll need maybe 3 or 4 fancy words from each poem you do...In mine I remember writing about fallás na truamhéala (pathetic fallacy) - I dont even know what it is in english!:D anyway it worked for me...and I did very little study...and barely any homework.....maybe only 2-3 Reading Comp's a week, although we had a good teacher in fairness.

You'll get a C3+ no bother, if you put in a bit of work...

PurpleFistMixer

I don't want to be all mad negative and stuff, but I think a lot of people are forgetting just how basic foundation level is... If you really have no "feel" for the language, I would definitely recommend against doing Irish. This is odd for me as I love Irish etc., but in comparison to say, Spanish or French, Irish is much more difficult.
For example, I got a spanish grammar book on Thursday, and from that I'm already able to put together decent enough sentences (okay I'll admit I have 8 years of French to back me up)... French/Spanish are nice because their syntax is so similar to that of English. Okay they've got the whole genders thing, but so does Irish, and so far in my studies of Spanish it's less irregular than French, and overall easier.

Good luck with whatever you choose though! (I almost did architecture at DIT but chose TP in the end, I'll find out if it's any good this year...)

gaybitch

Yes, Irish is difficult - but I have to say, from what I've heard, the LC Ordinary Exam might not be as challenging as Irish as a language.

Plenty of people can pass Ordinary Irish without a grasp on grammar, or even without being able to string a sentence together. Mastering Irish totally isn't necessarily required for this exam. It's sad for the language, but handy for the OP.

EDIT: And also, since the OP is repeating, he could really throw a lot of hard work into Irish to bring himself up from Foundation level. Good luck again!

catchthepigeon

in my opinion the best thing for you to do is just learn letters, sample answers etc, off by heart even if you dont understand them. just get your teacher to explain them to you. Even during the exam just right out anything you can remember. I have a friend who wrote around ten lines on the ordinary level irish exam and she got a C3!
BEST OF LUCK

Thanks to everyone for their replies, some useful tips! I've lots to think about anyway!

One of my friends said a good idea is to learn off the lyrics of a song in Irish. Pick a song with broad lyrics, and then on the day use the lyrics as phrases, and if you forget a phrase you can just run back through the tune of the song to remember it.

Good idea?!