THE LEARNER
Young immersion learners’ language use outside the classroom in a minority language context
There has been a long history of early Irish language learning in Ireland as a result of Government policy to
promote greater use of Irish. All children learn Irish in school from age 4–18 years. The majority learn Irish as a subject,
typically for 30–40 minutes per day, and the levels of competence achieved are mostly disappointing. Approximately 6.7% of primary
school children learn Irish in an immersion context, however, and these children achieve a high standard of communicative
competence. In this paper we examine the impact of Government policy on the transfer of linguistic competence from the classroom
to wider society in the context of a minority language that is becoming increasingly marginalised. We draw on data from three
studies to explore the relationship between Irish-medium school attendance and the desire and opportunity to use Irish outside of
school while attending school, and later as an adult. The first study also investigated students’ attitudes towards learning and
using Irish. All three studies examined parents use of Irish in the home and the influence that the language spoken in their home
during childhood and the language of their schooling had on their current language practices. Overall, Irish-medium schools are
very successful in educating proficient speakers of Irish who have very positive attitudes towards Irish. These positive attitudes
and proficiency do not necessarily transfer to use of Irish in the home. While attendance at an Irish-medium school as a child has
a positive effect on later use of Irish, when former students become parents, the effect is quite small. The perennial challenge
persists in transferring competence in a minority language acquired in school to the home and community.
Article outline
-
Introduction
- Irish language decline and revival
- New speakers of Irish
- Methods
- Results
- AMTB results
- Responses to parents’ questions
- Correlations between the student and parental results in study A
- Discussion
- Conclusion
- Notes
-
References
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O’Toole, Jane
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Identifying creative and participatory approaches to respond to existing challenges for Irish language teaching and learning at English-medium primary school level.
Irish Educational Studies 42:4
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