Ordinary Irish help

Ok, well heres the problem:

I'm repeating the leaving cert now, and last year I did foundation Irish as I was sure I was going to go to DIT; but I've changed my mind.

I have to learn irish, and get an OD3 next June or I can't do the new course I'm content on doing. I'm ridiculously bad at Irish: I never gave it any time throughout my life, and no very very little.

So my question basically is: What can I do to get an OD3? What parts of the papers should I do and what should I avoid? What should I study and what should I just forget about etc etc.

As I'm not using it for points I only need a OD3, so I'm not interested in how to get an A1, I just need to know how to pass!

Thanks.

K4t

Ask an Irish teacher ffs. Get a grind or two. Don't put something this important in the hands of some strangers on the internet.

Good luck. You will get your D3 if you do what I said.

leesmom

buy revisewise.
learn simple sections that you can write for the essay,story and letter,if you are bad at irish i would not recommend doing the comhra(conversation).you only need 10-15 good sentences for each of these. learn things like how to say the weather was good or bad, what you did/what happened, a concert,an accident, feelings happy or sad, time of day morning afternoon or night,you can then slot these in to either the essay,story and the letter, also learn an address in irish to put at the top of the letter, dont worry about the date as its on the front of the irish paper, you can use this at the top of your letter, learn how to say hello to a male or female and how to sign off a letter, no need to learn off loads for it, even if you were aiming for an A you dont need a vast amount of information in oridary level irish,its pretty basic stuff really.
for the comprehensions look at what the questions mean in revisewise and learn the meaning of the questions,its the same questions repeated over and over again.
for paper 2 you need to know your pros and poems. there are 5 of each that you need to know.
for the poetry concentrate on how to write about the theme of the poem,the feelings in the poem and whether you liked the poem or not.
for the pros learn a summary of the story, a bit about the characters and whether you liked them or not. all of this stuff is covered in revisewise and its only 8.95.if you now you stories and your poems well, you've already achieved about 20% of your exam.
i got a B1 in my leaving and i hadnt even learned much for it,im repeating now and hoping to get and A1,so this time round i'll be putting work in but really you shouldn't have that much diffiulty getting a D3 in it, i think its a fairly fool proof paper and i was always pretty crap at irish,simply beacause i dont like it,ite pretty boring i think.
anyway im waffleing now:rolleyes: best of luck

degausserxo

The oral at OL is worth 25% so work on that as well as the listening. Getting grinds aswell for a few weeks would probably be worth your while.

@K4t

Thanks for all your replies.

@K4t, obviously I've asked my teachers too, just thought a different perspective might help. And if you were to take that attitude with asking questions about LC on boards, it kind of defeats the whole point of having an LC section on boards doesn't it?

@leesmom, thanks very much for that comment, thanks for taking the time to write it! Found it very helpful.

@degausserxo, yah I'm starting to work on my oral now, listening to tapes and cd's, learning phrases etc.

Anymore advice would be much appreciated, any advice on dropping parts of the course that wouldn't be needed to achieve a D3 etc.

Thanks!

jaffa20

-JammyDodger- wrote: »

Anymore advice would be much appreciated, any advice on dropping parts of the course that wouldn't be needed to achieve a D3 etc.

Thanks!

No, that would be just stupid. Have a go at every part of the course. I did OL and got an A2 in my leaving. I wasn't going to count it as part of my points but i was pretty shocked at how i did. Any effort will go down well, i didn't even study the poem that came up and just made some effort at it and it payed off.

You can learn everything off for paper 2 and paper 1 is a doss really. I would concentrate on the oral a lot as you've got a good chunck of the marks before you even sit the written.

challengemaster

Oral is 25%
Aural is 20%

45% before you put pen to paper for the actual written exam. That in itself is a D3 - get 25-30% in that and you're doing well.

Look over last years poems to see what they are, they wont be coming up this year. Same fairly much for pros. Luckily enough there's not much in the pros or poetry to learn. Themes/techniques (2-3 max - focus on a main theme)

As already said, go over the letter and essay/story. These are generally easy enough to do, and don't require much length at OL. Know your letter layout - There's marks going for it.

Know your basic questions - who/what/when/why/where/how and you should be able to figure out what the comprehension questions mean. If in doubt - look for the same phrase in the comprehension as in the question. Write down the sentance if you're unsure.. Attempt is better than blanks.

You should probably be getting a B upwards if you get all that. Best of luck. Also thanks - this made me think about what I have to do myself!

spurious

When I was at school a million years ago, our Irish teacher gave us a piece of advice that applies to all languages. She said 'If you can't say it, don't say it'.

Don't worry if your essays, if translated, sound like they are written by a five year old, concentrate on being mistake-free.

Short simple sentences at OL are fine. Throw in the odd learned-off phrase and you'll be fine. OL Irish is very do-able.