Irish in schools

waterford5

Now that a student has succeeded in bypassing religion as a subject, when will we tackle Irish as a compulsory subject?
I see my children spend so much time studying Irish when they could be using this time to learn another language or spending more time on English or Maths...It is considered one of the most difficult languages to learn.....Most will never speak it after Leaving Cert...what are your thoughts? Why not maintain it as a minor subject, not compulsary ?

jg3114

waterford5 wrote: »

Now that a student has succeeded in bypassing religion as a subject, when will we tackle Irish as a compulsory subject?
I see my children spend so much time studying Irish when they could be using this time to learn another language or spending more time on English or Maths...It is considered one of the most difficult languages to learn.....Most will never speak it after Leaving Cert...what are your thoughts? Why not maintain it as a minor subject, not compulsory ?

I was exempt from Irish myself when I was 13 and can honestly say until I went to apply for medicine I never needed it and don't ever see myself needing it in life... Its is just held in there buy the argument "Its part of our culture" "Getting ride of Irish is letting our pride die" Which is true to an extent Irish will become even less popular and it will have a long term effect on our culture... However will it have a major or important effect? In my opinion no one thats worth forcing 50k new students a year to learn it...

I believe they should teach it up to primary level and then have it as a option in secondary or if needs must up to the end of the junior cycle and the for senior cycle have it as an option as while I believe Irish shouldn't be abandoned it shouldn't be compulsory or necessary for your future.... Because lets be honest here... How good a doctor in my case isnt going to be effected by my ability to recite a poem in Irish... But again the argument of "letting our culture die" Is one I dont think many can be bothered enough to argue with....

emersyn

There's no doubt about the fact that the way it's taught currently (at LC level anyway) is an absolute joke. By having most of the course consist of essays about horrifically low-quality stories and poems without making sure people actually understand how to speak the language, they're making it impossible to actually enjoy it. In most of my subjects I'm very diligent but Irish is by far my worst subject - I truly wish it wasn't, because I think it's a beautiful language. I wish I were good at it but the way it's taught in school doesn't focus on actually speaking the language, it focuses on dreary literature and essays that 90% of students memorise and regurgitate without understanding half of what they're writing. With this curriculum being forced upon students it's no wonder that practically no one will speak another word of Irish after leaving school.
In order for the Department of Education to get people enjoying learning the Irish language, they need to do two things: they need to make it non-compulsory and they need to completely rearrange the curriculum. If Irish were non-compulsory and if it were taught like any other language instead of being full of irrelevant literature I would 100% definitely still do it, as would a great deal of people I imagine. Being forced into doing something is the best way to make people hate that thing before they've even begun. The fact that I've been learning Irish for 12 years now and only have the fluency of a toddler at best is embarrassing. I know it's not me who's the problem because I am very close to being fluent in Spanish after spending only a third of that time studying it. I love languages and it would be criminal to let Irish die, but as things are, it's digging its own grave.