The knowledge economy myth

ei.sdraob

leninbenjamin wrote: »

Well, good to see your opinion on the history of the state and the vast majority of it's people. We're not going to agree on anything so. You must have had a very bad experience learning Irish as a kid or something as you're hostility towards it, while understandable, seems excessive and blinkered.

Hes right about one thing

in todays globalised world

our kids have to compete against 6-7 billion people

why shouldn't the kids be given an edge in a modern society?


teaching Irish compulsorly is a waste of time, why not give the students and their parents a choice

and see what they go for?

Permabear

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leninbenjamin

ei.sdraob wrote: »

teaching Irish compulsorly is a waste of time, why not give the students and their parents a choice

teaching the current Irish curriculum compulsorily is a waste of time. There's nothing to say the Irish language itself need be.

edit:

donegalfella wrote: »

Sorry, but I'm not going to participate in the consensual hallucination that we are an Irish-speaking people living in an Irish-speaking country. Statistically, that has not been true for hundreds of years.

I have English ancestry too. That doesn't mean I don't have Irish speaking ancestors either.

donegalfella wrote: »

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Ha, let me guess, it's because we speak English and have a highly educated workforce right? the truth of the matter is neither made much of a difference, the main factor for much of the FDI invested in this country is because we have low levels of corporate taxation.

#15

leninbenjamin wrote: »

teaching the current Irish curriculum compulsorily is a waste of time. There's nothing to say the Irish language itself need be.

The primary Irish curriculum is fine. What would you change about it?

No point forcing kids to learn Irish when adults won't use it in everyday situations. Kids are not stupid, they realise when their time is being wasted.

And spending 3 and a half hours teaching primary children Irish is a waste of their time, in the current environment. Society, and Irish adults, need to change their attitudes to Irish first.

As far as I can see, most Irish adults are happy to speak English, and English only.

Sponge Bob

Most Irish adults do not speak English, they speak 'story bud' skangerese or a similar doggerel . Why don't we try to fix that or is it too onerous a task ??

Just think of all the money wasted teaching english in Finglas or Tallaght over the years and what we have to show for it now.

Here is one unpalatable but true fact. The average DUTCH kid has OBJECTIVELY and TESTABLE better english ( as a a second language) than the average Dublin kid has as a FIRST language and by the age of 12 . Their basic standard of speech and literacy is higher .

There are parts of Holland where the kids are trilingual at 12, eg Friesland . Mind you they probably sit down in class when told which is half the battle if you ask me

Permabear

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leninbenjamin

donegalfella wrote: »

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well here's something that points to it:

"The cuts in income tax rates detailed earlier helped moderate the rate of inflation in wage costs, improved the competitiveness of labour and created the conditions conducive for investment by home and foreign entrepreneurs."

from Catching up with the leaders: The Irish Hare

I also remember reading a detailed study that suggested low taxation and the relative low cost of the work force accounted for between 60-80% of all FDI during the 90s. I can't for the life of me remember what the title was though, but if i find it I'll post it here.

Noreen1

Given the number of people who choose to send their children to a Gaelscoil, where available, I would suggest that quite a few Irish parents choose to have their children educated through the medium of Irish.

As a native Irish speaker, I can state from personal experience that the Irish language is difficult to embrace fully through the medium of direct translation from English - if only because, in many cases, there are no direct English translations for the words used, or the type of language used is uncommon in general use.

Consider, for example, in descriptive writing, the use of the word "foothill".
A direct translation would be "Spoir"(sleibhe). I have never actually heard that word used, in everyday conversation.
In Gaeilge, we would use "Faoi scath na gcnoic"

Now, consider the different images evoked by two similar sentences in English:
Those interested may wish to experiment by evoking a mental image of the scenes being described, before reading further.

1: A whitewashed cottage nestled in the foothills. (Spoir)

2: A whitewashed cottage in the shadow of the hills. (Faoi scath na gcnoic)


In the first sentence, the focus is on a cottage, with a vague awareness of hills in the backgound, and frequently no awareness of the sky.

In the second sentence, a wider picture emerges.
The scene suggests a cottage, surrounded by hills, usually bathed in sunlight (suggested by the word "shadow), and often evokes an image of a blue sky.

I believe that Gaelige is an integral part of our culture and identity, and, as such, it should be fostered and encouraged. The social benefits are incalculable. (Do not forget that the high regard Irish people are held in worldwide is due in no small part to our culture)Consider also the lower crime rates, and sense of community in the Gaeltachts.
However, I do not believe it should be compulsory in school, nor taught in the same way as modern European languages.........because attempts to do so have failed miserably. IMO, the only way to learn Irish is to speak it. Perhaps it is time to consider more Gaelscoileanna and Summer Schools for those who desire them.

This would enable the teaching of European languages in primary school, and thus give Irish children every possible advantage.

On the issue of religion being part of the Curriculum, surely that should be a matter of parental choice?
If ethnic minorites, of whatever culture or religion, have a right to having their culture and religion taught at school, and the Dept. of Education appears to have acknowledged that, then surely our native Irish children have no less right?

Noreen

Permabear

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#15

Noreen1 wrote: »

However, I do not believe it should be compulsory in school, nor taught in the same way as modern European languages.........because attempts to do so have failed miserably. IMO, the only way to learn Irish is to speak it. Perhaps it is time to consider more Gaelscoileanna and Summer Schools for those who desire them.

This would enable the teaching of European languages in primary school, and thus give Irish children every possible advantage.

On the issue of religion being part of the Curriculum, surely that should be a matter of parental choice?

Noreen

Noreen, this part of your post is spot on.

Songe Bob wrote:

Most Irish adults do not speak English, they speak 'story bud' skangerese or a similar doggerel . Why don't we try to fix that or is it too onerous a task ??

Just think of all the money wasted teaching english in Finglas or Tallaght over the years and what we have to show for it now.

Here is one unpalatable but true fact. The average DUTCH kid has OBJECTIVELY and TESTABLE better english ( as a a second language) than the average Dublin kid has as a FIRST language and by the age of 12 . Their basic standard of speech and literacy is higher .

There are parts of Holland where the kids are trilingual at 12, eg Friesland . Mind you they probably sit down in class when told which is half the battle if you ask me

Hiberno-English is fine, and completely acceptable. Although I agree with you on skangerese. The problem though, is a societal one, rather than a purely educational one. Behaviour comes into it, as you said.

Likewise with language learning, Irish people seem to have a particular dislike for it. Or maybe it is just complacency, being native English speakers.

In Holland, I'm sure it is more than just the education system - society expects people to become proficient in other langauges, and people probably have a lot more exposure to foreign languages than we have here in Ireland.

There is an 8 year old kid in my class from Saudi Arabia who can speak 7 languages. I asked him how he learned them and he insists that he did not learn them in classes. He said he learned them just by hearing native speakers converse. Its amazing. exposing our kids to foreign languages (preferably native speakers) at a young age is crucial.

leninbenjamin

donegalfella wrote: »

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you're right of course, Maths is hugely important, but the evidence seems to suggest our problems with maths as a nation stem from second level and not primary.

http://www.schooldays.ie/education-news-item/Irish-schools-tolerate-bad-teachers-19356185

There was a report there recently enough that suggested nearly 40% of second level maths teachers in this country aren't qualified to teach it.

http://www.tribune.ie/news/article/2009/oct/25/one-third-of-maths-teachers-unqualified/

#15

Maths is different to other subjects in that it is like building blocks.

If the foundations are not put in place at primary then its very difficult to succeed at secondary level.

At the moment more time needs to be given to Maths at primary level. The curriculum is good but there isn't enough time to make sure every child succeeds, unfortunately.

Permabear

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nice_guy80

thats bull****

Maths is given more time in every classroom as it takes a lot longer for skills and concepts to sink in.

English is the next most taught subject in primary as its integrated across nearly every other subject

Irish is scheduled the same as science, history, geography etc

syklops

leninbenjamin wrote:

b) tens of thousands of people in this country are fluent in it. Hundreds of thousands have a proficiency close to fluency.

Tens of thousands out of what? 5 Million?

leninbenjamin wrote:

c) Most bilingual regions develop entirely new dialects that are so different from the original, it's inaccessible to the original region. For example, plenty of Iberian Portuguese can't understand a whit of Brazilian Portuguese. The same thing would happen if we started speaking something else, which largely renders the point moot.

We have that problem with Irish The Donegal dialect is very different to the dialect spoken in Cork, Kerry and Galway.

leninbenjamin wrote:

The same thing would happen if we started speaking something else, which largely renders the point moot.

Are you basically saying we shouldn't learn anything else because it would be too difficult?

leninbenjamin wrote:

d) Another cultural reason; it's our own f*cking language, as spoken by my grandparents, and their grandparents. In many nations, a common language is the only source of a shared identity. We want to strengthen the nation's national identity in the economic world. Not undermine it.

Yes in many countries language is the only source of shared identity, Indonesia for example has 20 mainstream languages(not including English), but not Ireland in the 21st Century. Do we have a problem with our shared identity? Is there some sort of Irish Shared Identity Crisis that I am not aware of?

leninbenjamin wrote:

e) Another cultural reason; have you any idea how hard it is to learn a language for which you have no cultural context? European languages are fairly accessible to us as we share similar cultures... but Mandarin? ffs...

When I was in school learning Irish, I had no cultural context for it either. At home we spoke English. All the TV we watched was in English. The News was in English, the Newspaper was in English. For 3 hours a day I had to speak this other languages which I knew I would never need outside of school.

We went to Portugal on our holidays, and I learn't a little Portuguese, because I knew I would be back in Portugal sometime and would be able to use it. We went to France, and same thing I learnt a few phrases that would come in handy, and I still know them to this day.

As for the 3 hours a day Irish for 8 years and then the 3 hours a week for 6 years of irish I did, I can ask for permission to use the toilet, and could probably manage an essay on Mo Lahanta Saoire if I was pushed and that's all my 14 years of Education in Irish has gotten me.

Primary kids learn languages very quickly if they are given the opportunity. A 5/6 year old would learn the Russian Alphabet in a matter of days, and could probably learn to write Arabic in a couple of weeks. Writing Mandarin charachters would feel more like Art class than language learning to them. Imagine if we had tens of thousands of Irish graduates who could speak Russian or Arabic or Mandarin fluently. What would that do for the Knowledge Economy?

Noreen1

donegalfella wrote: »

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I would have thought that the ability to think creatively, which is an inherent part of the Irish language, would be of considerable assistance in R&D and engineering?
Certainly, in interviews that I have personally conducted in the past for in-house engineers and research technicians, we used psych tests, as well as standard interview techniques, to evaluate the candidates ability to think creatively when problem solving. Innovation is impossible without creative thinking, in addition to technical ability.

I do not disagree that our children need a better Maths education. I have also posted earlier in this thread that Irish students need to become fluent in European languages.
Therefore, in essence we agree. I was merely proposing what I consider to be an alternative, which would actually make more time available for the teaching of both Maths and languages.

donegalfella wrote: »

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I disagree. People in the Gaeltacht are exposed to the same media exposure as those in urban environments. Most households have cars (often several). Therefore, they have precisely the same opportunity to commit crime as those in urban environments, if not more, given the lower Garda presence. Yet the crime rates are significantly lower. One has to ask the question, "Why?"



quote=donegalfella;62751004]I agree; but that makes you an exception. The standard gaelgoir secretly fears that making Irish an optional subject might expose the true lack of interest in it—and so he will fight tooth and nail to have it forced upon every single child..[/quote]


I'm not at all sure that that's true of the standard Gaelgoir, though there are certainly some fanatics around.
The standard Gaelgoir, will, however, be likely to take offence at the suggestion that they should not be permitted to be educated through the medium of their native language, should they choose it.

donegalfella wrote: »

Nobody has a "right" to have their culture or religion taught in a publicly owned school.

Most primary schools in Ireland are not owned by the public (or state, if you prefer). They are owned by the parish - the teachers are paid by the state.

In summary:
I believe European languages should be taught at primary level.
I agree wholeheartedly that our performance, as a nation, in teaching Maths, is abysmal.

I'm not convinced that merely devoting more time to teaching Maths will solve this problem.
I think the whole system need to be analysed objectively, from the quality of teaching, to the methods employed, to ongoing assessment of each childs abilities, with changes to the level being studied by a child, where necessary.

Dept. of Education rules, where a substitute teacher are only permitted to supervise children, unless the class teacher has specifically laid down classwork, also need to be revised at second level.
The consequences of a teacher being on long-term sick leave can be devastating for their classes.
I'm sure there are other ridiculous rules that I am not aware of.

I sincerely believe that all these issues need to be considered, before any improvement to the current system can be implemented.

I am very much in favour of standards being improved in both Maths and European languages - I'm just not convinced that it as simple as removing Irish and Religion from the Curriculum.

Noreen

leninbenjamin

syklops wrote: »

Tens of thousands out of what? 5 Million?

4.2 and falling I believe.

syklops wrote: »

We have that problem with Irish The Donegal dialect is very different to the dialect spoken in Cork, Kerry and Galway.

They are actually not as different as people realise. There are a few sayings and that that differ, but most of it comes down to pronunciation which is fairly easy to pick up with proper exposure.

syklops wrote: »

Are you basically saying we shouldn't learn anything else because it would be too difficult?

I'm saying the point of learning a language as a child is not necessarily for the purpose of understanding or using that language in the future, but rather to activate the learning centres in the brain associated with attention, concentration and language and further a child's mental development. Irish is as well equipped as any language for these purposes, and we already have a significant infrastructure in place, let down by an absolutely terrible curriculum.

syklops wrote: »

Yes in many countries language is the only source of shared identity, Indonesia for example has 20 mainstream languages(not including English), but not Ireland in the 21st Century. Do we have a problem with our shared identity? Is there some sort of Irish Shared Identity Crisis that I am not aware of?

Obviously, given how many people in this country will readily abandon their culture.

syklops wrote: »

When I was in school learning Irish, I had no cultural context for it either. At home we spoke English. All the TV we watched was in English. The News was in English, the Newspaper was in English. For 3 hours a day I had to speak this other languages which I knew I would never need outside of school.

You did, whether you realised it or not. For example, many of the expressions that define Hiberno-English are simply direct translations of Irish into English. If you learned English in this country chances are you use some of these on a daily basis.

syklops wrote: »

As for the 3 hours a day Irish for 8 years and then the 3 hours a week for 6 years of irish I did, I can ask for permission to use the toilet, and could probably manage an essay on Mo Lahanta Saoire if I was pushed and that's all my 14 years of Education in Irish has gotten me.

Primary kids learn languages very quickly if they are given the opportunity. A 5/6 year old would learn the Russian Alphabet in a matter of days, and could probably learn to write Arabic in a couple of weeks. Writing Mandarin charachters would feel more like Art class than language learning to them. Imagine if we had tens of thousands of Irish graduates who could speak Russian or Arabic or Mandarin fluently. What would that do for the Knowledge Economy?

If a language is so easy to learn then, why is you aren't fluent in Irish then? The situation would be the exact same if you enforced Russian/Arabic/Mandarin on school-kids. And then of course there's the fact we'd have to import thousands of teachers in these respective languages to have the competency to teach them. In an ideal world with infinite resources you're proposal might hold water. But then again if we had infinite resources we wouldn't need to trade with any other nations...

musky

imo the reason why myself and millions of others cant speak irish is because it is bullied into us from an early age, if you associate something with discomfort than you will naturally repel it.

I would have liked to have learnt it, i would have been proud to have finished school as a fluent speaker but the standard of irish teaching is deplorable.

We used to be shunted into a room, the 'teacher' would scrawl a page from a book on the board and translate it at light speed, any questions were dealt with in an agressive manner, needless to say we switched off very quickly.

Hardly inspirational, btw 7 of us from class boycotted the leaving cert written exams 'cause we had higher maths the next day and that was far more relevant to us. Irish was the subject that was irelevant for points.

You can get around not having it for some colleges.

#15

nice_guy80 wrote: »

thats bull****

Maths is given more time in every classroom as it takes a lot longer for skills and concepts to sink in.

English is the next most taught subject in primary as its integrated across nearly every other subject

Irish is scheduled the same as science, history, geography etc

Look at page 79 of the PDF file. As a primary teacher I am required to teach to these specifications. Irish gets more time than maths, and way more time than science, history or geography.

http://www.ncca.ie/uploadedfiles/Curriculum/Intro_Eng.pdf

Permabear

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Sponge Bob

donegalfella wrote: »

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That only really proves her Irish is crap and that she will be unfit to teach it and will makes a hames of it once she gets her piece of paper .

Lucky for her the primary school inspectorate is complete rubbish then and that they constantly dumb down the standard rather than ENFORCE it ...especially when challenged with reality.

Permabear

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Sponge Bob

donegalfella wrote: »

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Maths is about 1/8th of the syllabus and the syllabus is hardly a state secret.

I cannot arrive into a maths teacher college and blithely tell them that I consider calculus optional but that I am a dab hand at stats and should be allowed to pass on that basis . They would quite rightly tell me to **** off .

She went for the easy money and finishing before 3pm with 3 months paid holidays a year, same as all the rest of them do in fairness . And I know a German born Irish primary school who had not the first notion of Irish some years back but amazingly she just went and learnt it like she was supposed to do

Your duty , Donegalfella, is to tell that woman to learn Irish well and teach Irish well once she has a generous contract from the Irish taxpayer .

No more moaning about it , thanks!

nice_guy80

I'm a primary teacher too

so go shove it up your _______

if you spend more time on Irish than English or Maths then you're doing something wrong

you know that what the guidelines suggest, and what actually happens in the classroom are a lot different. if you follow the guidelines exactly then fair play, the worlds first teacher i've ever met who does

Sponge Bob

Same place you store your Drumcondra Results from the sound of it .

#15

nice_guy80 wrote: »

I'm a primary teacher too

so go shove it up your _______

if you spend more time on Irish than English or Maths then you're doing something wrong

you know that what the guidelines suggest, and what actually happens in the classroom are a lot different. if you follow the guidelines exactly then fair play, the worlds first teacher i've ever met who does

Ah, the internet hard man:cool:

Our school has got school inspections this year, we don't have the luxury of being able to make up our own guidelines.

I know plenty of teachers who stick to the guidelines as much as possible, as stupid and all as the guidelines actually are.

nice_guy80

right...

well, most inspectors and principals understand the way classrooms actually work in the real world. you cannot simply timetable every subject as ordered. there aren't enough hours in the day. as for a WSE, they are just used to show schools are following guidelines.

i spend as much time as is needed at a subject. I judge whether the kids know the concepts and skills involved. i don't need official guidelines for that.

its called continuous assessment. and using your professional qualifications and skills to best help and teach the children

MrMicra

nice_guy80 wrote: »

i spend as much time as is needed at a subject. I judge whether the kids know the concepts and skills involved. i don't need official guidelines for that
...
using your professional qualifications and skills to best help and teach the children

this is the kind of person that I want to teach my grandchildren.

#15

nice_guy80 wrote: »

right...

well, most inspectors and principals understand the way classrooms actually work in the real world. you cannot simply timetable every subject as ordered. there aren't enough hours in the day. as for a WSE, they are just used to show schools are following guidelines.

i spend as much time as is needed at a subject. I judge whether the kids know the concepts and skills involved. i don't need official guidelines for that.

its called continuous assessment. and using your professional qualifications and skills to best help and teach the children

Fair points.
But come on man, could you imagine what kind of report I would get if I cut Irish down to 45 or 60 mins per week?:eek:

MysticalRain

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Most Irish adults do not speak English, they speak 'story bud' skangerese or a similar doggerel . Why don't we try to fix that or is it too onerous a task ??

Great way to stereotype 4.2 million people. It might amaze you, but many people outside certain areas in the Pale don't actually speak like skangers.

You can divert attention from the issue is much as you like, but the fact is Irish has been a millstone around the neck of Irish education for decades now. Bullying kids into learning it only gets people's backs up and teaches people to hate the language. I have no problem with schools teaching Irish, but it should not be made compulsory and given equal status to essential skills like English, maths or science.