What was the Primary school Irish book called?

Feral Mutant wrote:

I think I remember that. Was there a worm called Pol as well?

That definitely is ringing a bell, time to put on the kettle, it is going to be a long day.

Yeah, Lucy Luch and Lorcan Luch, the two mice, and Pól Péist, the worm.

Woul have been around 1989 when I used it.

I remember those mice alright...late Eighties I think.

Remember Busy At Maths with that freaky dude on the cover?

I went to an Irish speaking school can't remember the translation for it.

I remember just at the peak of the Nineties they introduced us to a book called 'Deco' about a skinhead from Gardiner Street.

Damn just had a serious flashback just now to a book called 'Footprints'

Its scary what your brain stores for years.

I think we had Solas (actually maybe Sonas?) and Súgradh, they came a few times during the year.

ciaran76 wrote:

What about Far A or Fas B etc etc.
Anyone remember those books ?

I remember the FAS ones mate. I thought I was the only one who went to a hedge school

spurious wrote:

I taught with the guy who wrote Deco - it was based on the kids in our school.

We used to get Sonas and Siamsa annuals.
In primary we had crappy little pictures with sandpaper on the back of them that the teacher used to stick to a screen that had stuff on it that was for all the world like a few pairs of black tights stretched across a frame.

Thats wicked about Deco!

And we had that nylon board with the sand paper pics too!

I remember those Solas and Siamsa magazines...

I'm not 100% but I've reawakened an old memory that is telling me the Freaky Guy in the Busy at Maths book was called Mathso...ring any bells for anyone?

This is showing I need to get a life but I used to work selling schoolbooks so know way too much about this to be healthy.

The Irish books were part of a series by Folens, they only really stopped printing them about three years ago and thats a major pity cos the Grammar in Vocab in them was brillaint, the stuff that they've been replaced with is diabolical. The series, as far as I remember it went as follows:

Tus Re - Very Ist Irish Book people would have had it was a an A4 Book with a picture of Lusai Luch in a Hot Air Balloon with the words "Tus Re" written on the Balloon part
Lusai Luch - Blue Book with Lusai on the front, I think on a scooter
Pol agus a Chairde - Red with a Picture of Pol Peist and his mates on the front
Ispini agus Subh - Either Yellow or Grey, can't be totally certain
Tine Chnamh - Picture of a big bonfire on the front of a Blue Book, was meant to be a 5th Class Book only but the Irish in it was pretty advanced so a lot of schools used it over two years and never got Spaslong
Spaslong - Grey Book with a picture of a spaceship with fire shooting out on the front

I think there are a few I'm missing at the beginning of the series cos the colours went yellow then red and I think there were a few more than one of each colour cos they were divided into "Ceimeanna" or steps of difficulty. Now that I think of it I think that the whole series might have been called "Dreimire" or ladder.

The Irish Language version of Busy at Maths was called "Gafa Le Mata", as in "Hooked on Maths"!, and they're still in use at some Gaeilscoileanna cos it took a long time for the major Primary School Maths Books in use now, Action Maths, to be published in Irish as "Mata Beo".

Busy at Maths/Gafa le Mata wss a CJ Fallon series rather than a Folens one.

Ok having just shown that I really have no life to know that much about old schoolbooks any questions just let me know - kinda miss selling the things, was one of the nicest Summer jobs you could ever have

Not offhand Ruu.

Most Primary School Books are based on Series, especially the English ones so all the grammar books, readers and workbooks will come under the under the one series. The Fallons English books, old and new, are called the Starways series and they used to all have the same characters for most of the series. Do you rememeber Tara and Ben and their dog called Holly. If the book you're on about is part of the series I'm thinking of then they would have been the main characters

Don't remember the characters at all or the publisher. Would love to see some pics of the old ones as well for those of us who are still stuck in our primary school years. My Mam has been a primary school teacher for ages, must nag her and find out some more.