Irish Should be compulsory?? WHAT YOU THINK?

Mayoegian

ddef wrote: »

what i find funny is that it is the generation that doesnt want to learn irish is being forced to do it. I'm 18 years old, I'm legally an adult, i shouldve have to be forced to learn something i dont want.
not to mention it sounds like a pig being castrated when someone speaks it.

Who says the generation before us didn't want to learn Irish? Your point there is invalid, many people who went to school 20, 30, 40 years ago didn't want to learn Irish either.

ddef

Mayoegian wrote: »

Who says the generation before us didn't want to learn Irish? Your point there is invalid, many people who went to school 20, 30, 40 years ago didn't want to learn Irish either.

well, obviously the generation before us do want us to learn irish, because, looky here, we're doing irish compulsary in school. and to prove my point i just said to my dad (pure inner city dub) that i was going to the shop as gaelige. he just said "l'anglais s'il vous plait

WhoDat

I understand why it's compulsory, but it's not beneficial. Students do not see Irish as a language in its own right, but as a subject. This is not good. We do Irish from day one and most people still leave school not being able to string a sentence together. I know that people are worried it will die out if it's not compulsory learning, but the fact is the vast majority of students hate Irish and it's mainly due to the fact that they are being forced to learn it. Why should a person who is not necessarily lingustic be forced to learn an archaic language that is not going to benefit them in the long run?

I think students should learn Irish in primary school and secondary school up until Junior Cert. After that, I think Leaving Cert Irish should be left to the students who have a passion for it. By that age, most people have their minds made up about Irish and nothing is going to change it.

grrrrrrrrrr

WhoDat wrote: »

I understand why it's compulsory, but it's not beneficial. Students do not see Irish as a language in its own right, but as a subject. This is not good. We do Irish from day one and most people still leave school not being able to string a sentence together. I know that people are worried it will die out if it's not compulsory learning, but the fact is the vast majority of students hate Irish and it's mainly due to the fact that they are being forced to learn it. Why should a person who is not necessarily lingustic be forced to learn an archaic language that is not going to benefit them in the long run?

I think students should learn Irish in primary school and secondary school up until Junior Cert. After that, I think Leaving Cert Irish should be left to the students who have a passion for it. By that age, most people have their minds made up about Irish and nothing is going to change it.

AND reform its teaching untill JC...

I was talking to a lecturer from a teacher training college and she said alot of teacher dont want to reform it to make it more oral based because they dont have a high enough standard themselves. Specially at primary, most of them only learn it cause they NEED it for their jobs as primary teachers

MiamiMortimer

Definitely. I hate not liking Irish, it being our native tongue, but really and truly what use is it for everyday life? I never spoke it until I had to in 6th year and I resent having to learn off reams of stuff because, unlike we do in French, we never learnt the verbs etc for Junior Cert and now can't formulate simple sentences!!!
My only hope of passing depends on how much of it I can remember, word for word!

Irish shouldn't be forced on anyone-it just leads to resentment and wasted points and time. It should be optional so those who love it can study it, not those who hate it.

MiamiMortimer

Mayoegian wrote: »

Who says the generation before us didn't want to learn Irish? Your point there is invalid, many people who went to school 20, 30, 40 years ago didn't want to learn Irish either.

My father had Irish beaten into him by the Christian Brothers and for what? He never speaks it. None of us do, why would we? It isn't right that we should be driven to despise Irish, but I can genuinely say I do.

grrrrrrrrrr

OK this thread could probably be closed now!

Results, iit should be optionalised.

Summary, vote FG and they'll hopefully make it optional.

Mayoegian

grrrrrrrrrr wrote: »

OK this thread could probably be closed now!

Results, iit should be optionalised.

Summary, vote FG and they'll hopefully make it optional.

Why should it be closed? Do you not want more people to air their opinions? The poll you made was confusing, and essentially misleading.

grrrrrrrrrr

Mayoegian wrote: »

Why should it be closed? Do you not want more people to air their opinions? The poll you made was confusing, and essentially misleading.

Well theres no further/new discussion/debate being generating is there?!?

Most people do want it at least optionalised... poll or no poll

Mayoegian

grrrrrrrrrr wrote: »

Well theres no further/new discussion/debate being generating is there?!?

Most people do want it at least optionalised... poll or no poll

The poll is void, therefore the results are also. Of course some people want it optionalised, the prospect of not having to do a subject that they find hard is attractive.

kaki

And even if the poll isn't considered void, 80 said yes, and 81 (58+15+8) were either in favour of leaving it the same, or did not care. Never mind the people who didn't bother to vote. So not exactly such a whitewash.

ironclaw

Mayoegian wrote: »

The poll is void, therefore the results are also. Of course some people want it optionalised, the prospect of not having to do a subject that they find hard is attractive.

I love this debate and its been going on for years. The poll is valid and is backup by a huge amount of research outside of Boards. Kids hate Irish, and for good reason. The course is extremely outdated. Its hard. And don't say it isn't. The best guy in my year, who was a Gaeltacht kid from age 10, got a B1. All those A1's etc you hear about are from Irish Schools etc, very few, if any, per year come from other forms of schools.(Check the DOE stats)

I love Irish, its a great language and does have its place. But its essentially useless. No employer will care you got an A in Irish if you failed Maths. Chemistry and Physics will get you a job, not Irish. Also, outside of Ireland, its useless. Someone wants remarked about how bookshops had more French / German grammar books that Irish ones. Why? Because they are GLOBAL languages with uses beyond our country. They are actually useful languages to have.

While not a dead horse, its time to stop throwing it at students. Ireland has grown up these past 15 years, its time Irish did too. Let students decide from JC on if they wish to do it or not. That would be my take on it. And the argument of doing a less hard subject etc is null. You'd still have to do 6 subjects and I would glady have done Biology, Japanese, IT etc over Irish, and none of them are exactly easier.

coldwood92

No! it shouldn't

Mayoegian

ironclaw wrote: »

I love this debate and its been going on for years. The poll is valid and is backup by a huge amount of research outside of Boards. Kids hate Irish, and for good reason. The course is extremely outdated. Its hard. And don't say it isn't. The best guy in my year, who was a Gaeltacht kid from age 10, got a B1. All those A1's etc you hear about are from Irish Schools etc, very few, if any, per year come from other forms of schools.(Check the DOE stats)

Could you please point out where I said that Irish wasn't a hard subject to learn?

ironclaw wrote: »

I love Irish, its a great language and does have its place. But its essentially useless. No employer will care you got an A in Irish if you failed Maths. Chemistry and Physics will get you a job, not Irish. Also, outside of Ireland, its useless. Someone wants remarked about how bookshops had more French / German grammar books that Irish ones. Why? Because they are GLOBAL languages with uses beyond our country. They are actually useful languages to have.

You need Irish to be a primary school teacher. You need to have a good grasp of the language to be able to teach it to young children.

ironclaw wrote: »

While not a dead horse, its time to stop throwing it at students. Ireland has grown up these past 15 years, its time Irish did too. Let students decide from JC on if they wish to do it or not. That would be my take on it. And the argument of doing a less hard subject etc is null. You'd still have to do 6 subjects and I would glady have done Biology, Japanese, IT etc over Irish, and none of them are exactly easier.

What was stopping you from doing these subjects? If you didn't want to put in the time for Irish, why didn't you move down to pass or foundation, and take up one of these subjects instead?

ride-the-spiral

Mayoegian wrote: »

You need Irish to be a primary school teacher. You need to have a good grasp of the language to be able to teach it to young children.

So if you want to be a primary school teacher, you choose to do Irish for the leaving cert. Much as if I want to be a doctor I will choose to do chemistry.

Mayoegian wrote: »

What was stopping you from doing these subjects? If you didn't want to put in the time for Irish, why didn't you move down to pass or foundation, and take up one of these subjects instead?

Well it's still time being wasted on a subject. He's saying that all the time, those 5 or 6 classes a week that you had to go to, that he could have been studying a subject more relevant to their interests or what they want to do.

grrrrrrrrrr

ride-the-spiral wrote: »

Well it's still time being wasted on a subject. He's saying that all the time, those 5 or 6 classes a week that you had to go to, that he could have been studying a subject more relevant to their interests or what they want to do.

Yes and whats the point in paying them teachers even if i do pass or foundation?!?!

PhosphoricAcid

A good idea for the course would be to make Irish-the language,speaking it,learning grammar etc one core subject and make other subjects such as irish poetry/irish histroy(through irish) optional..:P

grrrrrrrrrr

PhosphoricAcid wrote: »

A good idea for the course would be to make Irish-the language,speaking it,learning grammar etc one core subject and make other subjects such as irish poetry/irish histroy(through irish) optional..:P

Des Bishop was on about this... dont really see the point tho....

ride-the-spiral

grrrrrrrrrr wrote: »

Des Bishop was on about this... dont really see the point tho....

Well there's so many people against making it optional, so that's the best compromise. (If you could call it that.)

itsgrand

a dead language forced into the education system by politicians...welcome to ireland?

I.Am.A.Panda

Butting in halfway through the thread here, but just to point out a few things:

- Forcing people who don't want to do Irish to study it is a more negative effect than letting them not do it. The idea making it an option means its death is untrue - There are peopel who will take it, albeit in stronger numbers, but I'd be of the opinion that while interest in Irish will drop, it will be a less harder fall than the plausible retaliation once the students who hated Irish and were forced to do it get into positions of power and begin to perform purges against it.

- While Irish is possibly one of the easier language in terms of verbs and such, the way it's taught (In terms of learning huge essays on social issues, the environment, etc. and examining poetry and stories) is the main bone of contention for students. If a different approach was taken, and an attempt to modernise it properly (And not the feeble "Write about your new iPod using the out-dated vocab).

- Irish is easily the largest load of learning next to Maths for most students. It's closer to English than to the Continental languages, which is a gross distortion considering most students come into secondary school with some feeble Irish sentences on their age, name, numbers, colours and if they're lucky, a couple of sentences on their house and some knowledge of the verb tenses. Expecting higher level students to examine poetry, and write a 2 page essay after 3 years is a hefty load imo.

Well, that's my 2 cents.

MavisDavis

Various governments have been warned that the way Irish is taught is damaging since the foundation of the Free State. Nearly 80 years later and nothing has really changed..

I think there should be more debate over the future of the language. It's ours and we need to reclaim ownership of it from the hideous stereotypes of Péig and the MC. Perhaps by doing something along the lines of what the Welsh have done..

Anyway, whether it's compulsory for the LC or not, it should definitely remain so for the JC. Loads of students would drop it straight away at the start of secondary school because they wouldn't want to seem 'uncool' or whatever. And you don't really tend to know what you want to do at that age, you might need it. OP, you're wrong. Even if Irish was not a required subject for the Leaving Cert, it would still be a requirement for primary teaching. How could you teach children to speak a language you hadn't studied for years yourself?

grrrrrrrrrr

MavisDavis wrote: »

Various governments have been warned that the way Irish is taught is damaging since the foundation of the Free State. Nearly 80 years later and nothing has really changed..

Well the best chance of it being changed by a FF gov is gone since Mary Hanifin didnt change in! and theres no hope now that Mary Coughlan is in there!

I dont think it should be kept on in primary school, never mind untill the junior cert!! if you feel so strongly about it then go learn it outside school or force your kids to learn it outside school!!!

stainluss

If it was made opitonal this would save government money..

Colleges could then say a 'second language needed for entry', if you put it up there with french/german, most people would probably choose it! (examined at the same level continental languages are, of course)

grrrrrrrrrr

stainluss wrote: »

If it was made opitonal this would save government money..

Colleges could then say a 'second language needed for entry', if you put it up there with french/german, most people would probably choose it! (examined at the same level continental languages are, of course)

On the button there mate

manic mailman

Mayoegian wrote: »

In my opinion, Irish should be compulsary. It is our native language, and few countries have the privilege of having their own language. In many ways, it sets us apart.

However, I think there needs to be a revision of the course, because many people who are doing Irish, don't have a good grasp of it, yet they are expected to be able to comment and give their opinions on poetry and stories. Language is all about communicating, and I think there should be a larger emphasis on speaking and understanding it.

People are always saying 'I hate Irish', 'It shouldn't be made compulsary' etc. However, if you gave students have the chance to drop English or Maths-believe me, they'd take it. People tend to pick on Irish because it's that bit harder than those subjects, and they see no real point in studying it.

The Irish language is a huge part of both our cultural and historical heritage and if it was to be made optional, so many people would drop it that it would soon die out. Making it optional won't stop some people hating Irish-the same course would still be there. It's the curriculum that needs to be revised, and a larger emphasis placed on speaking and understanding it.

Tír gan teanga, tír gan anam!

You, sir, have hit the nail on it's head!

ride-the-spiral

May I ask about the reasons that the people who voted "leave it the same had?"

The only reasoning I can see behind that might be the cost.

kaki

Wait, how the frick would making Irish optional save the government money? If people don't study Irish, that time will be used for some other subject for which a different teacher will still be paid.

ride-the-spiral

kaki wrote: »

Wait, how the frick would making Irish optional save the government money? If people don't study Irish, that time will be used for some other subject for which a different teacher will still be paid.

Well it's very hard to say how much each subject costs the government. Irish might cost the government because of two papers, oral and aurals. But alot of subjects have their own cost, chemistry with materials etc.

kaki

That's my point, it seemed a few posts back that people were insinuating that making Irish optional would save money...it's practically impossible to tell how much money a certain subject costs the government...but I imagine the difference is relatively small, or maybe even non-existent.