Irish school (gaelscoil)-beneficial or not?

PGD1 you've made your feelings known about your lack of appreciation for our national language but all I'll say is I completely disagree with you and hope that some day you might feel a little bit proud of your language and feel inclined to change your views. As I said before, anything that promotes the language is good in my book and the more children that attend a Gaelscoil the better so that maybe the next generation can start using the language more in their day to day activities - I only wish that I could have more Irish speakers around me to converse with.

there seems to be an implication that investment in gael scoils is money that could go to more worthy schools. If there werent gael scoils then those kids would need to go to other schools and those schools get more funding to cater for the extra kids.

I dont know that theres any evidence that the gael scoils get more, per capita, than other schools and, if not, arent they every bit as entitled to the funding as any other school.

A gael scoil is a school where subjects are taught through Irish but, as far as I know, from a governmental point of view that is the only difference.

I also wish there was more day to day Irish and I would definitely speak it if there was.

There is, its called English (but you throw in a few words like Slainte and Craic so you can write in the Census that you use Irish everyday!)...

Actually, Bonafide (Latin scholar?), that's all anyone needs to do is throw in the few Irish phrases (Conas ata tu? Nach bhfuil an aimsir go hiontach/ufasach? Ar mhaith leat cupan tae?) to make the use of Irish more normal. I've been watching No Bearla, and am convinced that what stops most people speaking in Irish is their shame about not having fluent Irish. The more phrases we all use, the more normal it becomes, and that's how fluency grows.

Thats a very good point, we have no trouble using our few words of French, Spanish or German if we are abroad!

I am ashamed....

can anybody tell me where the best gaelscoil secondary schools are in dublin im desprate

Our language was taken away from us by colonial agressors who kept us back as a nation for hundreds of years.

I think it shows a confidence that people are taking back the language. I'd love to see a time when everybody speaks Irish as their first language while also retaining English as a second language.

If i'm blessed with children in the future I will be sending then to gael scoileanna.

I think alot of people dislike Irish because of the incorrect way it was thought to them at School.

I think Gaelscoils are more open and inclusive nowdays, but that wasnt always the case.

My brother attended a gaelscoil primary school 20 years ago - parents thought it would be good for his education. Turned out to be a big mistake. Whereas my brother had no difficulties with the language - he is still fluent to this day and got an A in honours in the Leaving Cert - the school was a nightmare. Parents sent him to an english speaking secondary school.

The gaelscoil he went to (which is still around) was an established one. At that time, the majority of the kids were from Irish speaking families i.e. speak Irish all the time at home - parents were from the gaeltacht. The minority of kids from non-Irish speaking familes were treated as second class citizens - teachers looked down on them and regarded them as less than dirt and over time, the gaeltacht kids picked up on it and you got what can only be described as an appartide situation whereby the non-Irish speaking family minority got a very hard time on all levels. There was a very anti-Dublin attitude. Though the kids from the Irish speaking families were born and bred in Dublin, they were brought up with the view that anything from the west of Ireland is good & anything from Dublin is bad. If my brother said cheered for Dublin in a GAA match, he would get a hard time from the other kids, thought they were also born in Dublin - bit like the complaints in England about English born spectators at cricket matches in some places cheering from Pakistan against England.

Brother also said the standard of teaching was poor - gets masked by the fact that the Irish educational stream is generally separate from the English and it is difficult to compare the actual standard in exams for papers answered in each language - generally exam papers in Irish will get marked easier (in addition to the extra 10%). Took him c.1 year to catch up with english speaking students when he switched to english speaking school.

I dont know what the schools are like now, but hopefully they have changed.

One thing to look out for is that the Irish requirement for entry into some universities will be dropped soon - it is against EU laws because applicants from all EU countries must be treated equally - cant have a requirement that Irish people need LC Irish to go to college, when it isnt a requirement for e.g German applicants to the same college. Also, my wife is a secondary school teacher & says that there are rumours going around that, due to the influx of foreign people to Ireland and anticipated future public demand (as well as the aforementioned EU reasons), Irish will be dropped as compulsory LC language sooner rather than later. 10% bonus is also likely to go to if challenged in court - try justifying giving an Irish speaking university applicant 10% extra marks than an english speaking one when both apply to do a course thought entirely in english. Kids starting gaelscoil today are unlikely to be able to avail of the bonus marks etc by the time they are LC age.

Tá sé suimiúil nach raibh focail i nGaeilge óna daoine agus iad ag plé leis an téama seo. Is tír dátheangach an tír seo, Gaeilge an phríomh teanga oifigiúil ach Béarla príomhteanga cumarsáideach na tíre. Na rudaí is tabhachtaí don pháiste ná, ionchur a tuismitheoirí agus an méad tacaíochta a thabharfadh siad don pháiste agus cé chomh héifeachtach is atá an scoil agus na múinteoirí.

The OP wonders "Gaelscoil-beneficial or not?"

To answer the question I would pose the question "of benefit to whom?"

1) a particular child.
2) the school going population.
3) parents of children attending Gaelscoileanna.
4) the Irish Nation.

Learning Irish is a distinct advantage especially for anyone living in Ireland - on a lot of levels both practical and social and cultural and utilitarian and etc. This realization is becoming more widely held and will surely continue in the future. Learning more than one language is most likely more natural and common place for most people in the world. The scene in Irish has a complicated history, true, but there is more agreement on the value of not being mono-glot especially in English, all over the world today.

The argument about Irish and its ability to prepare you for a job can be made about most subjects. For example most people who study Maths will only use the basic addition, substraction, multiplication,division and percentages for the rest of their lives. How many people who study French, German etc to LCert will ever use it ?
Education is not all about jobs.

Having studied in Wales for a time I saw how the Welsh people loved their language. Why? Because it's not compulsory in school, and people do it by choice, because they want to. Peig Sayers did little for my love of our language!

MissRibena said:

For one thing, in my area, the Irish schools are filled with children from a very narrow background range (i.e. white, middle-class, Irish Nationals).

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Out local Naoinra is quite different - several of the children are Polish or African, and several of the parents of these children are learning Irish (a course provided free by the gaelscoil principal in his own time) to support their childrens learning, and another group are from the local council estates, as well as the white middle class cadre you speak of. There's a good variety there, and in fact it reepresents a more balanced group of people than the other national schools in our area.

I have to admit that my own experience in my area of the whole gaelscoil thing has not been that good. It was certainly seen as elitist. I would have good Irish and was very amused to see people with absolutely no interest in it send their children there so that they wouldn't have to mix with certain 'undesirable' types!!!
Not a word of Irish seemed to be spoken in the yard by parents and the school got fantastic funding at a time when the local schools were not, and were in need of pupils. When we made a general enquiry about a child of ours transferring to the school, the principal told us that the board of management would have to meet because such admissions had to be considered carefully due to the foreign influence she would bring into their Irish school.
To be honest, I restrained myself from calling him the narrow minded Irish, nationalistic bigot that he is . My daughter is excellent at Irish, goes to the Gaeltacht regularly but I'm glad I didn't send her to that Gaelscoil.
In my opinion, Irish is one of the few National Sacred Cows left and the whole situation of the millions that have gone and are going into the teaching of it is something that must be looked at. Recent carry on by the Gaelscoileanna with Mary Hannifan and her demand(rightly in my opinion) that English be taught in Gaelscoileanna again wouldn't impress me.
But like everything, I'm sure there are good and bad schools.

when choosing any school for children the basic rule should be that all children are different. Yes alot of children are like sponges and soak up languages or maths but there are alot of children who struggle too. Just being in a gaelscoil does not necessarily mean that the child will love the langauge or soak it up. When moving forward into secondary school I've found over the years that very often many of them aren't able to articulate themselves in the essay type answers required if attending an english secondary school or even in business reports. Why - everything you are fluent in comes from practice whether its from using a language regularly, using maths in daily situations, etc. Where children from gaelscoils often fall down is that they haven't had practice in speaking or writing comprehensively in English. Many people will say but he/she reads loads of books. Great, nuture that but it doesn't necessarily translate into good fluent written english.

Yes they can have a love of the language and be rightly proud of their achievement in having completed years in a gaelscoil but a love of a language or subject can come in many ways. Eldest child went to english primary school and transferred to gaelcolaiste for secondary. She loves the language, her primary school fed that love and nurtured it. She can gets all high honours in her exams. Why - cos she loves it as a language and being able to express herself. Maybe in hindsight we should have sent her to a gaelscoil for primary but it certainly didn't hold her back in gael secondary.

Something else to point out is that many of the posters here have commented on the fact that their gaelscoils have great extra curricular activities, and lower class sizes. Not always. Any good school will have these activities. It does depend on the principal, teachers and the parental involvement though. We had great stuff going on in one local school until the principal retired and the new one wanted "none of that sort of thing". This can happen in any school, gael or english.

Just remember that children are different and children change and what might suit one family member might not suit the rest of the children. Or what might suit one child at jnr level might be a struggle as they move up the system.

Hello, I am in a bit of a dilema. I have three children 7,5 and 3.My 7 year old is in mainstream primary school but i am unhappy with it. I am thinking of moving him and starting 5 year old from scratch in september to the local gaelscoil. Just wondering if anyone has moved a child of this age to a gaelscoil. Im worried about his ability to grasp learning the subjects through Irish and to a lesser extent , making new friends...Any help with this would be greatly appreciated.

Hi Mamachick,

My niece (8yrs) transferred to a gaelscoil from an english speaking school in sept 08 to 2nd class and is thriving. At a parent teacher meeting in Dec 08 (4mths in) her teacher told her parents that her irish had improved dramatically. Initially she was included in the special help category with children who may need extra attention with certain subjects but she no long needs the extra help and has even surpassed some children who have been in the school since junior Infants!
Children at that age are like sponges.

I also know a woman whose primary education was at an english speaking school and changed to a gaelscoil at secondary level and she is now a teacher at a gaelscoil.........its never too late!

If you have the opportunity you should take it.

I wouldn't worry at all about a child aged 7 moving into a Gaeilscoil provided that the child does not arrive there with a problem. In other words, mamachick, you should give some thought to what is unsatisfactory about his present schooling. Only if you are sure that there is something identifiable about the school he is in now that is not right for him should you consider a move to a Gaeilscoil to be a good bet.