Having a lot of trouble with Irish..

AoifeK88

Okay I'm only in second year but I thought maybe somebody might be able to help me. I have an awful Irish teacher last year and this year. Last year I had no Irish teacher most days, she hurt her back and we mostly had free classes. This year our teacher is crap. All we do is learn essays, we haven't done any oral or listening at all. My Irish is very poor and I struggle to make sentences. I haven't a clue where to start and my vocabulary is very small. I really don't want to go to pass because I already do pass maths so any tips or anything? Is there any easy way to learn to make sentences.. I know it's hard to ask but I'm pretty desperte here

KirkCheated09

AoifeK88 wrote: »

Okay I'm only in second year but I thought maybe somebody might be able to help me. I have an awful Irish teacher last year and this year. Last year I had no Irish teacher most days, she hurt her back and we mostly had free classes. This year our teacher is crap. All we do is learn essays, we haven't done any oral or listening at all. My Irish is very poor and I struggle to make sentences. I haven't a clue where to start and my vocabulary is very small. I really don't want to go to pass because I already do pass maths so any tips or anything? Is there any easy way to learn to make sentences.. I know it's hard to ask but I'm pretty desperte here

I've had a sh!tty Irish teacher since first year. She never gave us homework or did much in class, do yourself a favour and set yourself your own homework, learn lots of vocab as well.

AoifeK88

KirkCheated09 wrote: »

I've had a sh!tty Irish teacher since first year. She never gave us homework or did much in class, do yourself a favour and set yourself your own homework, learn lots of vocab as well.

Will do thanks Is a revise wise book good to invest in for Irish?

if832uspx4eogt

Hey mate, I am in the same position, I was in a messes class and we get no work done. What I reccomend:

- Get Revise Wise Irish. Start at the first chapter and work your way through.
- Get the Exam Papers also and start from the beginning. Usually you don't get them till third year, but I think you could do with them.

Ok, so for Question 1+2 on P.1 is the comprehension. While it may look difficult, the key is to understand the questions. If you understand a few words from the question, you will get the jist and you will find the answer in the text, I don't think anyone actually understands the comprehensions, just take lines from the thing for your answer, in your own words.

For the grammar section, this is where Revise Wise will help. It gives you all the verb rules laid out really clearly. You will need to know numbers, uru's and all that **** so learn them off. You get two - one you need to change verbs into a different tense (usually future or present) so learn them off and one you have to insert words and numbers. The Revise Wise will cover all of it.

For the Ceapadóireacht, you have a choice of what you would like to write. I would reccomend the Sceal/Aiste as you can learn something off beforehand: the timpiste.

For the timpiste, it needs to be 350-400 words but you could probably scrape 300. A typical would be something like "describe an event that happened while you were abroa" or "describe a story that happened while shopping". Learn off lots of a phrases that would be in your book (and in Revise Wise). The best thing about is it can be all pre prepared. With the exception for the opening paragraph, you can learn the whole off.

So P2 is a bit harder, unfortunately. First question is the Prós. For the unseen Prós you will need a lot of practise as the give you a huge story and you have to answer questions, quite like the comprehension. It is very hard and probably my weakest section.

For the studied Prose, you learn off a story. For me, I learned "An T-Adh" by Padraig O Conaire. You have to pick a theme from the list and write how that theme is in the story. Don't worry! It is really easy as long as you know the story.

Next is Poetry. The unseen Poems is the same as the unseen Pros, really hard. But if you keep doing the exam papers, you will get the hang of it. For the studied poems, study one or two poems. I am studying "An Luichin Sa Schoil" as it deals with lots of themes. About half a page is enough for this, but you will need a quote (2-4 lines from the poem) to back up your point. Again - don't fret it! You have ample time to prepare a poem or two.

And finall, the Litir. It can be unpredictable and you can't really learn anything off. But what you can learn is the opening and closing paragraph. Get lots of phrases, and make two good paragraphs to open and close your letter as it will really make an impression, trust me! It will take a lot of strain off you during the exam, that you have two of 5 paragraphs already learned off! Apart from that, all I can say is start learning a lot of vocabulary.

And finally, the Listening. The Exam Papers come with a CD - use it! Most people just throw away the CDs. If you have an iPod, load them all onto it. Before you listen to your music, take 10 minutes to do a listening comprehension! It will really benefit you!

That's the best advice I can give you. Remember, you have a whole year to study and prepare so don't worry, I am doing it in 3 weeks!!! Also, I would see if there is any person giving Irish grinds in your area, I think they could really benefit you! Also, if you can afford it, go to the Gaelteacht for 3 weeks this summer. You will really benefit from it!

Hope this helped

KirkCheated09

AoifeK88 wrote: »

Will do thanks Is a revise wise book good to invest in for Irish?

Yeah I got a revise wise a couple of weeks ago, it's great for story, letter vocab and the like.

Jeanie96

You can do the irish aurals online at www.mocks.ie keep up the work, it'll help next year!

xfabgalx

Don't go buying exam papers for this year! Just get the papers questions online!

bisset

Have you thought about going to Irish College for a few weeks during the summer? Also trying watching Nuacht without having seen/heard the news in English and see how much you can understand.

ForensicGuy44

Yea like others have said I would try to get as much outside of the classroom help as you can, maybe from classmates that can teach you better but try to stick it out an hopefully it gets better!

Insect Overlord

Pick up a Glance Card from your nearest decent book shop. It has the basics for verbs in the Modh Ordaitheach, Aimsire Caite ("Inné"), Aimsire Láithreach ("Gach Lá") and Aimsir Fháistineach ("Amárach"), as well as the lists for the Forainmneacha Réamhfhoclacha (pronouns) and simple questions (where? when? how? etc). Should only be €4/€5. I've heard of a similar card for general sentence starters and links for paragraphs which could be useful as well, but I haven't used it myself.

Write a few simple sentences with as many verbs as you can, one verb to start each sentence. Use it in conjunction with a foclóir to expand your vocabulary bit by bit. Word webs/spidograms for different topics are good for that too, one A4 page per topic.

After that there are lists of general vocabulary you can apply to most poetry/prose answers. Themes, tones, images, techniques, emotions, metaphors, symbols, that kind of thing. These are the kinds of things you'll be using for the Leaving Cert as well, so it'd be handy to get to know them early on.

I hate the idea of people learning off answers to questions. Pick up the vocab instead and you'll be able to apply it to any question, instead of having to rely on predictions for the exam.