Aibu to think there is advantages to Gaelic schools eg Irish/Welsh/Scottish medium education? Thinking of sending dc to one... All opinions appreciated

[MammabearX1]

Hi, I'm in Ireland & the best local shool in the area is a Gaelscoil (all subjects done through irish language)
DH & I have barely any irish from the leaving cert. Please tell me aibu to consider irish medium for dc?
Please tell me about
-the benefits of attending a Gaelic medium school

• does English or maths suffer
• are the children usually more driven seeing as it was a conscious choice by the parents?
• my family consider the Gaelscoils extremely snobby, I can't understand this as they are not fee paying...
• please tell me about irish speaking secondary schools. Do children who go to the Irish secondary schools generally get more points.

Thanks in advance..

I never attended an gaelscoil myself but one of my college mates did and got into a 500+ point course. He was very good at English and maths and said that the hardest thing when transferring to college was remember basic sciencey terms in English when he had learnt them in Irish originally. However that’s something that wore off after a few months seeing as he did great in his degree. I think the biggest benefit is that you do get a few extra points for doing the exams through Irish but I’m not exactly sure how that works. There’s also different junior cert Irish exams these days depending on if you’re in a Irish or English speaking school but that doesn’t affect the leaving cert.

Thanks so much for replying... Would love to hear from any Welsh or Scottish parents who decided on a Gaelic medium school. We need to pay our deposit in a few days if we decide to take the place

Welsh is a Celtic language, OP, not Gaelic!

My daughter's too young yet but she'll be going into SG education when the time comes. There are so many advantages of being bilingual and a lot of money is put into GME so I think she'll have a better experience than in English medium. Gaelic is her first language so it's the natural thing to do anywsy.

Mine went to Welsh primary then English secondary. I don't think it hurt their English or their maths, and gave them a guaranteed A* in the compulsory Welsh GCSE

@ElphabaTheGreen - they're both Celtic languages (along with Breton and Cornish (P-Celtic) and Manx Gaelic (Q-Celtic).

We don't speak any Welsh at home but they picked it up like sponges. Difficult for us to help with homework though

My daughter did Welsh medium primary and lower secondary and mixed upper secondary. No welsh spoken at home but I was supportive of it (no choice in the county I lived in - all primary education is Welsh medium - but I’d have chosen Welsh medium anyway). It was brilliant. Dual language is shown to be beneficial in lots of studies. What really helped DD with tests was taking her welsh language notes and converting them to English questions for me to ask her. Doing that really ensured she focussed on the topics and understood them.
It also has lots of benefits for cultural identity and community cohesion.

We’re English with a child in a Welsh medium school, there’s no alternative in our local authority, all primary schools are Welsh medium. She’s pretty much fluent in Welsh at 6. I speak some Welsh but not enough to help with all homework/homeschool, which is very frustrating, school comms are in Welsh too. Are you going to be able to support your child through this?

I didn't attend a Gaeilscoil but in general they do have good exam results. I do know someone who found doing college through English really hard because she didn't know any of the terms or how to express herself and won't send her own child to a gaeilscoil but then I know someone else who got 600 points and is a doctor who has absolutely no issue with the transition to learning through English.
I do get some people thinking gaeilscoileanna are snobby, they definitely have a reputation and can be very competitive and academic.
I don't have kids yet but there's a good gaeilscoil near me and I would definitely consider sending a child there but tá cupla focail agamsa, I'm not sure I'd feel the same if I couldn't speak Irish.

My DS goes to a Gaelscoil, north of Ireland. He’s 11 and well ahead of his age in Maths & English. I’d send him again in a heartbeat 💗

I also had this dilemma before he started too and I’m so glad I chose the way I did

At least it's not a catholic school.

Also I have very little Irish

Welsh is not Gaelic.

My dc went to Welsh medium schools and had an excellent education. The class sizes were smaller and they both really enjoyed both primary and secondary. Being fluent in Welsh is also an advantage when job seeking here - especially in the public sector. There is lots of evidence that being bilingual is good for developing thinking and learning skills.

Both left school with excellent results. However both struggle to spell some words in English - Welsh is phonetic - English clearly is not. The small class sizes were great, but as it was a small school they did have a more limited choice of subjects, especially at A Level.

They also have a parent who is first language Welsh who could support them for homework etc.

Overall I would thoroughly recommend any child who has the opportunity to be bilingual - in whatever language it is - to go for it. It will never be a disadvantage. My dc are very proud to be fluent Welsh speakers.

You’ll find a huge number of parents at a Gaelscoil will be in the same position as you unless you actually live in a functioning Gaeltacht.
My sister was schooled through Irish from preschool to secondary. She had to relearn a lot of the vocabulary for university as she didn’t know the English term. Other than that there were no huge disadvantages and a lot of advantages to being fluent in an additional language (currently works for TG4)

My daughter started in a gaelscoil last year and son will start this September. Like yourselves we have fairly basic Irish, this was one of our main reasons for choosing gaelscoil, I wanted my kids to have an easier time learning it than we did.
Any of the research I did shows that other languages/subjects etc don't suffer and that being bi-lingual(in any language) is a big advantage.

My daughter is loving school so far. She doesn't even register the fact that she's "learning"Irish , it's just all fun at this stage. Her English isn't suffering, she's learning to read and is doing great.

@Davros

At least it's not a catholic school.

How do you know? What’s wrong exactly with a Catholic school? The vast majority of our primary schools are.

I was in a similar dilemma with schooling. My Welsh is haphazard at best so I was concerned about sending my children to school through Welsh medium but now with a yr9 and yr3 child in the system I'm really happy.

Neither had any trouble adapting to 100% Welsh in school despite it not being spoken at home and when English was formally introduced in yr3 both took to it really well (early days for DD2 but she can comfortably read Harry Potter having only started to learn to read in English in September so I'm happy with that as a measure of progress).

If they choose to stay in Wales then being fluent is another string to their bow from an employment perspective. If they leave Wales they'll have a stronger connection with their heritage.

As ElphabaTheGreen said Welsh is Celtic not Gaelic, it has more in common with Cornish than either Irish or Scottish Gaelic but I think the education merits will be similar.

@ElphabaTheGreen

Welsh is a Celtic language, OP, not Gaelic!

Elphaba huge apologies for the mix up☺️

Re the extra marks at leaving cert, you get 10% of the marks you didn’t get
Eg. If you achieve 90%, you get an extra 1% ( 100-90)*10%
If you achieve 40%, you get an extra 6% (100-60)*10%

My DDs attended both Gaelscoil and Gaelcholaiste. DD2 is dyslexic, has managed both Irish and French pretty well. She got fantastic support during her primary years, which sets her up great for secondary.
It has been an extremely satisfactory experience for my family.

If you have leaving cert Irish you should be able to help them with homework during Primary. We had to explain Maths in English, once they understood process they were fine.

In secondary they translate easily between Irish and English. Keep in mind secondary kids will mostly work independently and not need much help from parents.

My Dd attends Welsh medium high school, best decision we made for her. Dh and I speak no Welsh, I have some rubbish welsh from school myself, but she passed me miles back in the language department.
She's now year 11, I worried about her not using Welsh in lockdown, but online classes see to have kept her up to speed.
Her English is excellent, it's her first language and oviously taught in English. I hasn't affected her Maths seeing it's being taught in Welsh.
A levels are taught in English (unless it's Welsh class) She's signed up for sciences and I was worried about them being in Welsh and limiting where she goes to Uni. But no wrry as they use English for the A levels.
Nice small school, all very close and proud of the school it's a really good atmosphere.

Why would their maths suffer?

How does it work with things like meetings, presentations to parents etc? Are they in Irish/Welsh? Is that tricky for parents who don't speak the language well? I think there are great benefits to being bilingual and it's the best way to learn another language.

In the bit of Scotland that i know it seems to at least partly act like a middle class filter (much like faith schools), and once it gets a rep for that more MC parents come and it becomes a sought after school. Maybe that’s what your relatives mean?

I don't think there are many employment benefits in Scotland. Gaelic media is saturated and there are few, if any, public sector posts where Gaelic would be stipulated.