Class on November 26th

A Chairde,
Aine Mhaire was wondering if the college would be open for our classes on Wed Nov 26th, that is the night before Thankgiving. The college had confirmed these dates with me in June but I checked again and yes, La Penta will be open and our classes will go ahead as planned that evening.

Support for Learners from The Language Centre

There are many resources for Irish language learners available on various websites. One which is popular with An Scoil Chois Claí is the Language Centre at The National University of Ireland ,Maynooth .

1. The TEG site gives support to both teachers of adults and adult learners. The curriculum which is set out is a good guide to learning conversational Irish in a classroom setting. Most teachers who use this curriculum will augment it with grammar explanations and background information about the history of the Irish Language and its role in the history of the Irish people. Adult learners are usually interested in more than the acquisition of the language alone.

2.For more advanced learners the VIFAX portion of the Maynooth síte is very useful and again can be used by learners both within the classroom setting and for practice alone. The videos are fully supported by lesson plans and transcripts.

For too long the Irish language outside of Irish speaking families was supposed to be kept alive and well by schoolchildren, I think this has been finally recognized as being an unfair task for young Irish children. As soon as adults in Ireland start using Irish then children will be happy to use it too. I’ve never met a child who isn’t happy to answer me in Irish if I ask a simple question, (usually the answer will be accompanied by a giggle,) whereas it is often older people who will answer in English, indicating of course that the question was understood. It is often a lack of confidence rather than negativism towards the language that causes this. Although most Irish speakers have experienced negativism at some time or another. The support that sites like this one at the Language Centre provide can be very helpful to the small conversational language groups which are coming into existence timpeall na tíre

Language Joy

We got off to a good start on Wednesday evening.
Classes start at 6pm until 7 15pm and then the second classes are from 7 30 until 8 45.

I hope everyone got parking passes from the security office. These passes entitle parking in visitor spaces only. One still cannot park in the reserved places. The security personnel are most dedicated to ticketing and putting a boot on any car in the wrong place. (Could they work on commission?)

BTW in Ireland a ‘boot’ of this nature is called a clamp, a boot is in fact the trunk of the car, not to mention bonnets and hoods………..This caused all sorts of vocabulary misunderstandings the night my own car was ‘booted’ in IONA . I had to go to security, I asked them (nicely) to remove the clamp from my car, I was met with a blank stare. I said “There is a clamp on my car….please take it off?” then I had to explain that it was a sort of lock on my wheel. “Oh the boot!” “No, no” I said, “the boot is fine I want the clamp taken off?” The blank stare was now confused. It went downhill from there.

Feicfidh mé sibh an tseachtain seo chugainn.

See you all next week

Classes will soon begin!

Dia Dhaoibh a chairde, Hello all
We will soon be back in class in IONA.
Wed 24th @ 6 PM for the Ard Rang with Hilary and the Meán Rang with Eibhlín. 7 30 PM for the Beginners with Hilary and Ard Rang with Caoimhe.
Thank you to all who signed up early, availing of the discount!! It makes everything much easier for Eibhlín, Caoimhe and myself when we have an idea of how many will be in the first class. Thank you to the person whose idea this was...you know who you are :)
Enjoy the final days of Summer weather as we move into Autumn and please continue to spread the word about our classes, send this blog address to anyone you know who might be interested in joining us.

We will be sharing the second floor of the La Penta building from approx 7 30pm with some pipers who will be in the large McGrath function room practicing.
I think we can cope. We spent years sharing our previous lodgings with pipers, tinwhistle players, accordion players and dancers so I dont think anyone will mind if we hear the strains of piping in the background.

Classes Resume at An Scoil Chois Clái

Hello folks,
We are just thinking about our new 10 week term at Iona college. We will have classes on Wednesday evening this time.

Sept 24
Oct 1, 8, 15, 22,
Nov 5, 12, 19, 26,
Dec 3

Again offering 4 levels : Beginners, Intermediate, Advanced 1 and Advanced 2.
Beginners / Hilary @ 7 30PM
Intermediate / Eibhlin @ 6 PM
Advanced 1/ Caoimhe @ 7 30PM
Advanced 2/Hilary @ 6 PM

We will start the first classes at 6 Pm until 7 15 and the second classes at 7 30 until 8 45 PM so we will be ending just 15 minutes earlier than previously.

If you have any inquiries please send an email to an.scoil.chois.clai@gmail.com
Go raibh maith agaibh.

Irish Language Day - March 29th in IONA College, New Rochelle, NY.

A Chairde,
What a great day! Everything went well, even lunch was better this year. Wonderful teachers and lecturers, great booksales and raffle.
Thanks so much to all who helped make it work. Siobhán Shea, Naomi McCooe, Seán Feeney, Bernadette Broderick, Donncha Ó Cuinn, Maire and Colie O'Leary, Joan O'Connell, Una McGillicuddy, Brenda Ní Shuilleabháin, Mairéad McKendry, Elaine Ní Bhraonáin, Eibhín Zurell.

Pandemonium in Grand Central Terminal

Sorry that I couldn’t make it last night folks, as you can imagine It was pandemonium in GCT though………. Hordes of people panicking. At one point I was actually carried along by a crowd running to get on a train to Norwalk…I almost got on it as I didn’t know what the panic was about at the time and thought that something had happened in the city and any way out would be better than staying…………..Then I asked a man who would nt stop to answer me, then I asked another who told me about the building collapse…………
Trains were running one and a half to two hours late.....oh well....We’ll have a make up session.

Make Up Date

We will have a make up class on April 29th, due to the cancellation of classes on February 12th.

New session begun

We started the new term last Tuesday night, Feb 19, without incident…It is nice to see everyone again. There was some discussion about moving the classes to Wednesday evening which is something we will look at in the future if Wednesday suits more people. For now however we will stay with Tuesday as organized. I have not received confirmation of our make up date yet and will post it here as soon as I know.

Fáilte Romhat. Welcome

A Chairde,
This objective of this site is to provide information on the activities of An Scoil Chois Claí. In addition, as was proved yesterday, February 12th, (which should have been the first day of our current 10 weeks session at IONA College,) it will be valuable in disseminating information when plans change, due to weather or any other unforeseen event. Posts to this site will be primarily in English as it is not intended to be a learning center, but more of a support to our activities, a communication point, and it must be accessible to all.

Slán tamall,
Hilary