Acmhainní do Scoileanna lán-Ghaeilge agus Gaeltachta ar Scoilnet
April 4, 2012
TG4 show tackles new oral Irish exam
April 3, 2012
As Leaving Certificate students prepare for this year’s Irish language oral exam, TG4 are set to broadcast a new programme, ‘Cuireadh chun cainte’ featuring actor Marcus Lamb which will ease students into the revised new format of the exam.
The programme will air on Wednesday 11th April at 11a.m to facilitate students preparing for the exam.
This is first year of a new syllabus for both the written and oral exam at Leaving Certificate level. From 2012, 40% of the marks for the Irish exam will be awarded for the Irish oral, an exam which takes place over a fifteen minute period.
This increased emphasis on the oral exam will mean that the expert advice compiled by educational experts for ‘Cuireadh Chun Cainte’ will be beneficial to students tackling the new syllabus.
‘Cuireadh Chun Cainte’ has been produced by Comhdháil Náisiúnta na Gaeilge and Comhar na Múinteoirí Gaeilge, for students who will be undertaking the new Irish oral for their Leaving Certificate from 2012 on.
In the programme Marcus Lamb ( Ros na Rún, Corp agus Anam) explains the structure of the new oral exam and he takes students through a real-life scenario where a ‘scrúdaitheoir’ or examiner meets students of varying language abilities. He also explains new elements to this year’s exam which differ greatly from the béaltriail as we know it, including a new section where students have to comment on a series of pictures.
‘Cuireadh chun Cainte’ gives students the tools to successfully undertake each of the four components of the exam at either Higher or Ordinary Level.
The programme is suitable for students at both Higher and Ordinary Level, as practical advice is given on to how to avoid common pitfalls, and how to undertake effective communication with the examiner.
For those wanting to gain extra marks, extra hints are given to those with a good proficiency in Irish to help them add to their fluency, their vocabulary and their communication skills.
Extra learning resources such as a handbook and videos of individual poems are available free of charge on the Irish language news and information website http://www.gaelport.com/cuireadhchuncainteb.
GAELPORT
Bunscoil an Iúir chosen to help promote Olympic Torch
April 3, 2012
Primary 7 pupil, Tom Magill has been extremely lucky to have been chosen to represent Bunscoil an Iúir in the promotion of the Olympic Torch coming to Newry.
Boxing star, Wayne McCullough, also known as the Pocket Rocket, will be there to celebrate this once in a lifetime occasion and Tom can’t wait to meet him.
Congratulating Tom is past pupil Oisín Murphy, who was one of the senior Gaelic footballers of St Paul’s High School to have been crowned All-Ireland champions at the weekend. Tom is due to leave the Bunscoil at the end of the year and this occasion will mark one of the highlights of his primary school life.
Also, this week, Bunscoil an Iúir were delighted to receive the Inspectorate’s report and to learn that they were very happy with the work seen during their Monitoring Visit. The school Principal, Maria Caraher said, “The Inspectorate have given very positive feedback from their visit and I would like to thank the staff for their commitment towards this goal. I thank the parents and of course the children for their continued hard work and support and congratulate them all on the latest positive step in the life of Bunscoil an Iúir.”
Language immersion is more effective than classroom language learning
April 3, 2012
How does a person learn to speak French like a Frenchman or Spanish like a Spaniard? While most people believe that the best way to learn a new language is to live in the country where one speaks the language (language immersion), test results from earlier studies show that classroom instruction is better.
A new research from Georgetown University Medical Center shows that learning languages by immersion is actually much more effective than learning languages at a classroom. Michael Ullman, Ph.D., a professor of neuroscience at Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) was not convinced by earlier studies showing that classroom language learning is more effective than language immersion. Ullman who is bilingual himself in English and French, studied together with his colleagues how the brain handles language acquisition, comparing classroom teaching to an immersion exercise.
To understand the impact of immersion versus classroom grammar instruction, Ullman and his colleagues taught a small group of participants to speak and understand an artificial language of only 13 words. Its grammar was constructed to be like that of natural languages, but not like English.
The intention of the research was to investigate how foreign language learners can achieve native-like processing of grammar.
The scientists found that after a few days, participants reached high proficiency in the language, whether they had undergone classroom – or immersion-like training. However, measures of brain processing showed that different types of training led to different brain mechanisms.
The results from the study show that when learning a foreign language by immersion, adults attain and retain the brain patterns of native speakers.
Only the immersion training led to full native-like brain processing of grammar. So if you learn a language you can come to use native language brain processes, but you may need immersion rather than classroom exposure, Ullman says.
The researchers attempted also to answer another interesting question: What happens after you’ve reached high proficiency in a foreign language, if you don’t keep on being exposed to it? Do you lose the use of any native-language brain mechanisms that you’ve attained?
In order to find answer to the question, the researchers asked the participants to come back about five months later for another round of brain scanning.
“To our surprise, the participants actually became more native like in their brain processing of grammar. And this was true for both training groups, though it was still the case that only the immersion group showed full native-like processing of syntax” Ullman said.
Ullman and his team are attempting now to find out why immersion learning and periods with no exposure help one to reach native-like brain processing of syntax. “We have lots and lots of next steps, in many different directions. We are extremely excited about this research, and how it may help people learn foreign languages and possibly recover from language disorders” said Ullman.
Download the entire research paper:
Second Language Processing Shows Increased Native Like Neural Responses after Months of No Exposure (18 pages, PDF)
Cuairt Ghaelscoil Eiscir Riada ar Ghaelscoil Naomh Pádraig
April 3, 2012
Seachtain na Gaeilge i Scoil Gharbháin
April 2, 2012
Céilí Mór
Cancel your tickets for ‘Riverdance’ we had ‘Riverdance’ here in the yard on Thursday last to celebrate ‘Seachtain na Gaeilge’. We had at least a hundred Michael Flatleys. The children thoroughly enjoyed the fun and dancing which brought Seachtain na Gaoluinne to an enjoyable close. This has now become an annual event thanks to Múinteoir Muireann. Muireann organised the event and she also practiced the ‘Céilí dances with the classes and she created a wonderful atmosphere amongst us as usual. A big thank you to Máire Ní Chadhla our sound technician. Competition was at a all time high as the statue dance began and congratulations to our winners.
Table Quiz
We would like to thank all our local schools and their parents who supported us with this event for the first time. We were overjoyed to see the attendance on the night. Thanks to you it was a resounding success. Praise is well deserved by all the pupils from the Local Schools who attended this Quiz. The standard was very high and the children were very competitive. Míle buíochas to all the staff here in Scoil Gharbháin and to rang 5 and rang 6 for all their efforts in organising the event and to Coiste na dTuismitheoirí for organising our spot prizes.
We are extremely grateful to ‘Gaelscoileanna’ who generously sponsored this event. We have decided to make this an annual event and we’re going to include Rang 3 and Rang 4 next year and that’s a definite date for the diary.
Congratulations to our winners.
Celtic Week in Bank of Ireland
We would like to thank Bank of Ireland for the invitation they extended to us to be part of Celtic Week and for the warm welcome we received in the bank on Friday morning last. Múinteoir Máire and Múinteoir Muireann spent the week practicing and preparing the children for the occasion. We had a most enjoyable morning in the bank playing music on accordions, concertinas, violins, banjos, bodhráin and tin whistles it was fabulous to hear. The children sang accompanied by Múinteoir Máire and gave the customers a display of ceili dancing the ‘Bridge of Athlone’ under the guidance of Múinteoir Muireann. We were very proud of them. A big thank you to our parents who came to support us, it was much appreciated.
Offaly schools on top at Scriobh Leabhar Awards
April 2, 2012
There was great excitement in the Killeshin Hotel, Portlaoise on March 15 when over 280 teachers, principals, parents, grandparents and pupils converged to celebrate the publication of over 340 books written in Irish by 441 pupils from 13 schools in Laois, Offaly, and North Tipperary in the Scríobh Leabhar 2012 project.
This exciting project is co-ordinated by Laois Education Centre in partnership with Foras na Gaeilge.
The Scriobh Leabhar project is a relatively new initiative for Laois Education Centre and links the curricular areas of Visual Arts, and Gaeilge, while also promoting integration with practically every other curricular area for teacher and pupil. It is a particularly valuable tool for teachers to develop pupil creative writing and oral language skills‘as gaeilge’.
Guest of Honour on the night, Jim O’Brien, journalist, author, radio presenter and scriptwriter for RTE complimented Laois Education Centre on the very efficient organisation of the project. He said the books were a great compliment to all the teachers, pupils and parents involved.
He also said that it was not just the number of books published that was significant; it was the quality of the work of all involved. Jim entertained all present with a poem that involved Jedward’s hair, much to the amusement of both young and old. Jim also emphasised how important it is for pupils to take pride in their native language and how evident this was in the beautiful books presented ‘as gaeilge’.
Jim Enright, Director of Laois Education Centre welcomed all present and stated that Laois Education Centre was delighted to be in a position to offer the Scriobh Leabhar project to schools. He commented on the quality and presentation of the books which represented a very diverse range of topics from Mé Féin, Éadai, Gadai Uafasach, agus Gadai, Timpiste etc, all of which were beautifully and artistically illustrated and went on to say that schools involvement in this type of collaborative writing project very much supports the national Numeracy and Literacy strategy as we strive to improve our numeracy and literacy OECD rankings.
Entries were received from four Gaelscoileanna and nine other primary schools. Jim thanked his colleagues in the Education Centre who had done enormous work in coordinating and organizing the project in particular Yvonne Nolan who administered the project.
He also thanked Máire from Foras na Gaeilge for their support of the project. He thanked the principals and teachers who supported their pupils, read other class books and helped with recommending awards. He finally thanked Jim O’Brien for his contribution to the evening.
Máire Uí Fhaogháin from Foras na Gaeilge also commented on the quality of the books and said ‘the standard of written Irish was very high which augured well for the future of Irish in the midlands’.
82 pupils were presented with a medal and a certificate of participation on the evening and each of the 441 participating pupils received a certificate of participation and a Scriobh Leabhar pencil pack.
OFFALY EXPRESS
Number claiming they speak Irish reaches 1.7 million
April 2, 2012
ALMOST 2pc of people speak a cupla focal on a daily basis outside of school.
The first detailed results of last year’s Census show the number of people who claim to be able to speak Irish increased by 7.1pc between 2006 and 2011 to 1.77 million people. But almost one in three (30.9pc) of 10 to 19-year-olds said they couldn’t speak the language.
In total 1.8pc of people said they spoke the language every day, 2.6pc used it weekly, while 14.3pc said they turned to it less often.
However, 12.2pc of people within the education system said they spoke the language daily, but only at schools and colleges.
More women than men speak the language — 44.9pc of females compared with 37.9pc of males.
Of the 1.77 million who said they could speak it, 77,185 used it daily outside the education system (up 5,037 since 2006), a further 110,642 use it weekly (up 7,781), while 613,236 used it less often (up 27,139).
One in four said they never used it.
The total population of all Gaeltacht areas in April last year was 96,628, up from 91,862 six years ago.
Of these, 66,238 or 68.5pc, indicated they could speak Irish.
IRISH INDEPENDENT
Number of Irish speakers up by 7.1%
April 2, 2012
THE CENSUS recorded a 7.1 per cent increase in the number of self-declared Irish speakers.
Some 1.77 million people said they could speak Irish – 41.4 per cent of respondents.
More women than men answered “yes” when asked if they could speak Irish. Almost 45 per cent of women said they could speak Irish compared with almost 38 per cent of men. The Central Statistics Office noted that more women than men consistently identified themselves as being able to speak Irish.
Almost 31 per cent of 10-19-year- olds said they could not speak Irish. That increased to 36 per cent for 17-year-olds and 18-year-olds.
Of the 1.77 million who said they could speak Irish, just 1.8 per cent said they spoke it daily outside the education system.
This was an increase of 5,037 people since the previous census. A further 2.6 per cent said they spoke it weekly while 12.2 per cent spoke it within the education system.
Some 14.3 per cent said they spoke it less often – this was an increase of 27,139 and was the largest increase of all categories.
One in four said they never spoke Irish.
Of the 77,185 people who spoke Irish daily, outside the classroom, one in three lived in Gaeltacht areas.
The census recorded a 5.2 per cent increase in the Gaeltacht population. Some 96,628 people were living in Gaeltacht areas on census night 2011 compared with 91,862 in 2006.
Some 68.5 per cent of Gaeltacht dwellers said they could speak Irish and 24 per cent said they spoke it daily, outside the education system. This was an increase of 2.9 per cent on the number of daily Irish speakers in 2006. However, the number of Gaeltacht dwellers who said they spoke Irish less than weekly increased by 6.6 per cent.
The findings were welcomed by Minister of State at the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Dinny McGinley. He said the increase in the number of people able to speak Irish was a positive development in terms of the 20-year strategy for the Irish language.
“The increase in the number of daily Irish speakers in Gaeltacht areas is good news, particularly since the 20-year strategy has set a target of a 25 per cent increase in this area over its lifetime,” said Mr McGinley.
IRISH TIMES
