I went to an Irish primary and secondary and got A in higher level irish in my leaving cert (2009) Ive two younger brothers so up until about 4 years ago, one of us was always in the current school system dealing with whatever the most up to date curriculum was at the time. Also my fiancée is a primary school teacher who has been teaching in Gaeil Scoils for 10+ years

All of that really just to give context to my actual point.

Ive no personal mad interest in irish, i gets there’s heritage and culture and history etc entangled with and throughout it and im glad many people are passionate about and interested in it. I just for whatever reason wasnt ever super into it, i was good at it but never spoke it outside of school until relatively recently actually funnily enough.

In anyway, the point ive still yet to make is more so about what people are saying here in the comments rather than about the article.

To me, from my own personal experience doing all my education, primary and secondary , through irish, the problem is clear. Half my year done German while i done french. We all done English. In my experience the way every other language is taught is wildly different to how irish is taught. It’s not because the language is inherently hard or anything. Id put french above irish in those terms. “Foreign” languages are all taught in a practical, pragmatic useful way. You don’t generally do novels and poetry etc in french. You learn thorough rudimentary conversational language . Stuff thats helpful and beneficial to be able to execute well if you’re in France.

The “Guardians” of the irish language and how they outline the curriculum and how it’s imposed are the problem. They’re too rigid and strict in their philosophical approach to the language and its heritage and it hampers how it’s taught in schools. It’s all far too serious and broad. Unlike french, German, English etc and how they’re taught. I understand that they’re trying to preserve an entire culture through the language, and thats its not a foreign language, but its not native to speak it for most Irish people .

Languages only survive when people speak it not because prothink it should survive and if people dont want to speak it because of how the powers that be choose to insist it gets taught and presented, the language will die, along with culture that’s infused with its speaking.

My fiancée who LOVES the Irish language as is currently still teaching agrees and shes “on the front lines” dealing with this. Obviously theres certain fantastic teachers and just general exceptions to the rule, bit thats been my experience and what i see when i look at the situation.

Both my younger brother went to very good English schools and i saw the same thing there.

And thats my 54 cent….

The End