- This topic has 13 replies, 1 voice, and was last updated 11 years, 2 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Dia diobh, go léir! I recently bought a tablet with Skype capabilities, but I have no one to skype with, and I would really like to skype with people who also are learning and/or speak Gaeilge.
If you would like to email me first, my email is candrews86@gmail.com.
Let me know if you might want to practice speaking in Skype!
Go raibh maith agaibh!
SérilI’d also be willing to speak with beginners if anyone is interested. I know skype is a good resource for learning how to speak, but it’s near impossible to find people to speak with if you don’t already know them. I hope someone would like to give it a try.
Go raibh maith agaibh!
SérilI hate to say it but I agree. If you do some reading on the subject, I think you’ll be convinced that speaking with people who aren’t fluent or native is not that productive and possibly even a negative thing from a learning perspective. You may have fun doing it and meet some new interesting people, so that doesn’t necessarily mean don’t do it. But there are actually much more productive things you can do.
There are so many great series on Youtube that have subtitles. It’s not the same as talking to someone, but for instance watch episodes of the show “Comhrá” and you will get a good sampling of casual conversation between people of often different dialects. Try to imitate what they say as they are having their conversation. Parroting a native speaker is far more valuable a learning experience than bungling your way through a conversation with someone who doesn’t even know if you’re correct or not, even though it may feel the opposite.
I think it is more important to speak and make lots of mistakes than it is to wait until you can speak “correctly”. “Bad habits” can be unlearned easily enough when you have the opportunity to be around fluent speakers, or even when you listen to recordings or read. There are so many internal barriers to making mistakes that are a much bigger problem than whether or not you “get it right”. Labhairt! Whenever you can, with whomever is willing.
I get what you’re saying, and obviously I don’t “know” the right answer here, but I’ve read too much to the contrary to really believe that myself.
I really believe that the benefit of speaking with someone who is still learning a language is not as great as speaking it to yourself while listening to a native or fluent speaker. But however you want to spend your practice time is up to each person.
Yeah, like in the rest of life, making mistakes is only ever helpful if you learn from them (which presupposes having a way to do that) such that you don’t make them again…
There are only about 15,000 native Irish speakers who actually use the language daily
I’ve always wondered what the real figure was, I know most official statistics are incredibly exaggerated.
I was just wondering if you think younger native speakers are under influence from Anglified Irish. On an amateur level
I’ve noticed younger native speakers in Munster speak in a manner much more like “School Irish”, sometimes with
the same English sounds in their phonology.I’ve noticed younger native speakers in Munster speak in a manner much more like “School Irish”, sometimes with the same English sounds in their phonology.
I’ve noticed this is as well.
I wish I could disagree with myself because, on a general philosophical level, language should be and deserves to be spoken. But on the other hand, I have learned several languages (not quite to the point of fluency, but still quite a bit) and can play over 10 different musical instruments to some degree of proficiency (I’m skilled at a few of them) and everything about my experience at both tells me that learning bad habits with the intention of getting rid of them at some later date is a huge mistake. It runs counter to both my experience and everything I’ve read about how the brain learns. You need to entrain yourself with good habits such that your brain doesn’t think about the right way to do things it just does them that way. If you are full of bad habits, you will always be locked in the realm of conscious thought trying to navigate your own obstacles rather than letting the language flow from you naturally as you become used to the correct way of doing it.
When I speak Irish with others, it is the speaking that is most useful to me, not the listening. I’m not worried about picking up bad habits from the mistakes of the person speaking back to me. It’s my speaking that is important. It’s how I exercise what I’ve learned from books, courses, recordings, TG4, RnG, advanced speakers.
I have plenty of inhibitions and fears that I have to challenge to get myself talking. (Will I sound stupid, unimpressive, childish? Will I be laughed at or embarassed?) Getting past those blocks is critical if I’m ever going to progress beyond understanding the language to actually being able to communicate in it. I give myself permission to make lots of mistakes. Getting it right will come with lots of practice, but if I don’t practice, I’ll never get there. I sometimes think of it as if I were an infant learning a language for the first time, or a toddler learning to walk. Fall down, get up, fall down, get up, cry, fall down, never giving up, making lots of tumbles, feeling and showing the frustration of that, getting up and trying again.
What you’re describing IS valuable to a point and, again, I hate that I must sound very cranky like I’m telling people not to practice or to do what they enjoy or to keep the language alive. That’s not really what I want to say so I hope I’m not coming off like that. There is absolutely something to be said for conquering your embarrassment and go through the interactive process of trying something you don’t usually do. But I just think it’s important to recognize that for what it is: a social exercise, not a linguistic one. You would get the exact same benefit (linguistically, not socially/behaviorally/confidence/etc) from saying those same things to yourself in an empty room as you would saying them to someone who may or may not understand you or be able to correct you if you’re wrong.
It’s also important to recognize the rather large difference between language learning and language acquisition. I know your analogy wasn’t necessarily meant to be perfect, but as an infant you are literally inundated with native speakers in a way that, as a learner “falling and getting back up again” you probably aren’t. The brain learns language very differently than it “acquires” it (the term used by linguists for the way you get your native language as a child). I encourage you to read about this as it actually can help a lot in learning languages to know how this really works, and there has been a wealth of study done on the subject.
Again, I hope I’m not coming off like a dick because my intentions are just that I hate to see people doing what I perceive as a time-wasting endeavor, and sometimes we feel like we’re doing something productive when it may not in fact be such. And I certainly don’t want to discourage you from doing something you simply enjoy, whether it’s productive or not.
I would agree with Seáinín that speaking to other learners can be beneficial, as long as you’re aware of their mistakes and don’t start to copy them. Language teachers often ask students to discuss a certain topic in pairs or groups. What it does is give you the confidence to speak the language yourself, no matter how much you stumble at first. Practice makes perfect, as they say.
Of course, in an ideal world, we would all love to chat to native speakers, but if you combine Skyping with listening to RnaG, reading in Irish, posting questions on this forum 😉 , the results needn’t be too bad either.
This has been a great discussion! I definitely think there are pros and cons to skyping with other learners to speak Gaeilge, and yes, it would mostly be a chance to use what I learn in the books and from the other sources that I study, and to get past the mental barrier that keeps people from stepping into the deepend of speaking a new language. The lack of native speakers to converse with is one reason skyping has become so prevailent, the need to speak is overwhelming the availability of native speakers. I would love for more native speakers to become active in the Skype community, more Gaeilge teachers from the Gaeltacht interacting on an international level. Rosettastone employs some native speakers to act as teachers durring their “Studio Sessions” but they are something that is not always available an can be a little intimidating.
I will definitely take the warning that you give on learning mistakes, and I will hopefully be able to speak, using what I’ve learned is the “correct” way to say things, and if I don’t know for sure, simply write that down as something to learn later…not something to learn on skype with another learner. If they suggest a way to say something, I’d ask for a reference to a site/book where they learned that and check out the material for myself.
I found a group on Facebook that does Skyping as Gaeilge that I think might be useful to people who want to do with (and yet take it with a grain of salt). On Facebook the group is called Gael Skype.
Go raibh maith agaibh as d’fhreagraí go léir!
SérilHi all, first too all I’m usually a snooper on this website than post but this is a topic that interests me so ill post my 2 cent.
Irish is a language without many natives. To learn a language you should practise with as many natives as possible. It is far from possible for most people. So we have to compromise. There are purists who beautify the language to an extent that one would never speak it for fear of being less than perfect. In my experience speaking with learners give you chance to practice what you have, and that is great, if you keep it in your head it won’t come out right in the rare chance you get to use Irish. You need to be practising and using it daily for it to stick in your brain and be available at the blink of an eye ie a real live conversation. Ideally everyone should speak with natives to practice, but that isn’t going to happen with Irish, unless your lucky enough to live near the Gaeltacht or are friends with someone from there. So if someone wants to learn Irish they are going to have to speak with learners. A french person may have plenty of access to native English speakers but they will never talk exactly, except in extremely rare cases, as an Englishman would. So when you accept a learner is never going to sound exactly like a native you have to accept they are going to sound different. Should they not learn the language because they won’t sound native? Or should they do the best they can speaking to natives where rarely possible but mainly other learners? In my opinion the language is where it is, 15-17 thousand people living in communities where Irish is spoken by over 70% of population vs tens if not hundreds (so some degree) of thousands of L2 speakers. In my opinion people should practice what they have when they can, with whoever we can. With natives where possible, but accepting the reality that will rarely be possible and having fun in learning what can be a vibrant language when used.
The confidence gained from having fun talking to natives or learners and accepting you will make mistakes is the key part for creating L2 speakers. 99% of us will never sound like a native, we accept we are learners and do our best.
Bí ag caint, le chuile dhuine!
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
