Blog

ClubLeabhar.com

Teanglann.ie

Molscéal

Sing Fónaic

-This is an amazing resource. The only Irish phonics program that I have found

http://homepage.tinet.ie/~seaghan/story/sceal.htm

-this one “writes” stories for you

4 Meán Fómhair

Starting fresh…..School is starting. It is getting cooler (hopefully). September always makes me think of new beginnings. Like many of you I have been trying to learn my language, Irish, for many years, too many to say without feeling shame at my lack of progress.

So it has come to this, I have started a blog.

Tá sé tagtha chun seo, tá blag tosaithe agam.

Is cosúil gurb é náire íon an bealach is fearr chun mé a spreagadh chun Ghaeilge a fhoghlaim í ndáiríre. Mar sin beidh mé anseo, ag foghlaim agus ag déanamh mo bhotúin go léir go poiblí. Tar liom ar an turas náireach seo.

Más í an Ghaeilge do theanga, gabhaim mo leithscéal ó chroí. Más í an Ghaeilge an teanga atá tú ag iarraidh a fhoghlaim, is féidir leat a bhraitheann ar a laghad go bhfuil tú níos fearr ná mise

6 Meán Fómhair

Okay, feeling good. Figured out this whole blog thing-got some stuff up. Not a lot of Irish, but not nothing.

Tá sé an lá deas. Rinne mé blág. D’fhoilsigh mé roinnt rudaí. Ní mórán Gaeilge, ach ní tada.

13 Meán Fómhair

Lacking motivation…….

Ní maith…… Táim ag léamh Manchán Magan. Nascfaidh mé leis nair a bheidh mé ag foghlaim conas é sin a dhéanamh.

14 Meán Fómhair

Bheul, tá sé seo “frustrating”, de réir dealraimh, ag scríobh blag tá sé deacair. Ní aon fhios agam faoi ríomhaire.

19 Meán Fómhiar

Is fauth liom ‘auto-correct’!!!!!!!! An bhfuil bealach ann gan é a úsáid????

20 Meán Fómhair

Goals for today

-listen to a podcast, read an O’Brien book, write a post

XX Meán Fómhair

O’Brien books! These are lovely early reader books that sadly still seem difficult for me. Ugh. Baby steps

21 Meán Fómhair

Starting a book! Who wants to read with me?

The ideal read would be a trashy romance or a “movie” book like Dan Brown. Something fast and interesting. In a minority language these are not really options. It is more read what you can find. What we can find are kid books. The bonus here is that at the lower levels these are generally, in whatever their original language, written to captivate and encourage kids to continue reading. They will use simple works and repeat similar sentence structures. They also have to have a good story–they are competing with playing outside, video games and all the other joys of childhood.

We will be starting our “book club” with “The boy in the dress” by David Walliams. The very serious reasons that this book was chosen are, 1) an English exists in my house 2) it is available in Irish :).

The format will be much like the excellent format that they have over at Clubleabhar. If you are better at Irish than me then you should head directly over to them. Make yourself a logon and jump in. They even have a podcast as Gaeilge discussing each monthly selection. If you are still a beginner then stick with me (we will make it eventually).

22 Meán Fómahir

How to read in a language that you don’t know….

yes, it will be painful. If you actually enjoy reading (do people not?), it will be especially awful. This is finally what gave me empathy for those that don’t enjoy reading. It is a pain to only half understand something and stop and look up words basically every sentence. Fortunately AI exists (did I really say that?). I did–if you are vaguely my age you may remember struggling through languages at school. “reading” assignments were literally painful. I distinctly remember sitting on my floor giving the evil eye to the enormous dictionary and wishing that there was a calculator-thing that I could just type the word into and get the answer. “if I could only have that it would be sooo easy” I clearly remember this. Can you believe it? It actually happened! For once we really do have warp drive:). Online dictionaries are our magical Jetson life made true. In non-minority languages you can even read on an electronic device and just tap the word for even more instant magic. Sometimes technology actually works.

For Irish is it a bit trickier, but still so doable. Some people like to write all over their books–writing the English word directly into the book. Sadly my handwriting is not neat enough for that–and I find that when I go back to read then my eyes just jump straight to the English. I also have the public school kid fear of writing in the book–it still just feels wrong even if it is mine. What I have managed to do is underline the word. This also helps with my inherent laziness. Even though the magic of online dictionaries exists it still breaks the flow of reading to stop and look something up once a sentence. I underline the word and move on. Once a chapter I go back, write down all my underlines and look them up. This also forces me to go back through the chapter again. I might even get really motivated and make a Quizlet of my missed words. At the moment though, the most I am hoping for is for the list of unknown words to get shorter with each chapter.

23 Meán Fómhair

Caibidil a haon. So far it is very Roald Dahl–or maybe that is the lovely Quentin Blake illustrations–that man is a genius! And the best (for a language learner) starting sentence ever. “Bhí Dennis difriúil”. I’ve got it! I can do this. Whoops, sentence 2–tenses…..ugh. Wait, don’t go yet-really this will help. Remember in language class when you learned past tense, future tense, subjunctive tense–what? we have that? what is that in English? Exactly, you didn’t learn you native language like that. You just learned. Could I tell you the past participle of “go”? No. Can I speak and read English? Yes. This will help you recognize the root verbs and learn the tenses that I am sure you have done some “Christian Brothers” exercises on, but in a more natural setting. Keep going, just underline the word and try to get the gist of the sentence. If you get totally stuck you can stop and look up something but try to get through an entire page just plowing through.

24 Meán Fómhair

Did you do at least the first page? Yeah! And who cares that it is only half a page. You did it! Now we go back and really figure out what it says. I had 3 words.

an-leamh = very boring. This one emphasizes the importance of the fada. I initially read it as “very-reading”–what?? léamh = read, leamh = uninteresting

áirithe = certainty, surety

gairbhéal = gravel

These two together in the same sentence are what remind you that languages express concepts, not words. Word-by-word translation doesn’t really make sense. “Bhí tarmac os comhair tithe áirithe vagus gairbhéal os comhair tithe eile” does not mean ” was driveway in front of houses sure and gravel in front of houses other”. It essentially means that some houses had smooth “sure” driveways and others had gravel driveways. The original sentence in English is” One had a gravel drive, another had crazy paving.” What is really being described is the slight difference in economic circumstances–some of the houses were ever-so-slightly nicer than the others, but basically they were all the same. The next few sentences make this even more clear. You can get this gist initially without translating. Going back and understanding the meanings of “áirithe” and “gairbhéal” just adds depth.

Don’t worry, it will get easier. I did not read Caibidil a haon all in one sitting. Initially it was page by make myself do another page. ugh!

Focail as Caibidil a haon:

https://quizlet.com/835490331/caibidil-a-haon-ghuna-flash-cards/?i=bhsad&x=1qqt

cé gur	even though, although
áirithe	certain, sure
os comhair	in front of
a léirigh	that showed
cé chomh	how
ba chrá croí	it was a pain, heartbreaking
cosc	prohibited
i dtine chnámh	in a bone fire??? I think this is the concept of “bonfire”
d’éirigh	got up
d’éalaigh	escaped
mín	smooth
uirthi féin	on herself
cón	cone
éiginnteacht	uncertainty
é ag iarraidh intinn a mháthair a léamh	wanting to read his mother’s mind
ab ansa leis	was his favorite
tugadh deis	opportunity was given
i gceannas	in charge
mífholláin	unhealthy
ar chláir gháirsiúla	program obscence/filthy
nós	custom
nós suí ar éadan	habit of sitting on one’s face
faoin tráth seo	by this time
faraor, is amhlaigh	unfortunately it is
ionann	equal
murab ionann agus	if not equal ??
d’aontaigh	agreed
a lua	to mention
is measa ar fad	worst of all
cosc ar	ban on
cráite	tormented
airím uaim	i miss you
sin an méid	that’s the point
go dtiocfadh	to come? would come?
ag tuile agus ag trá	by flood & ebb

So wow, that looks like a lot of words–or maybe, you think that is far to few. Your list will be different. And yes, I realize that I have “cosc” basically on there twice. With ClubLeabhar they tend to only define a word the first time that it is used. For me, even though I read the chapter in more than one sitting, if I still didn’t remember that “cosc” meant prohibition, I figure it should still go on the list–hopefully it will not keep appearing in further chapters.

Did I make a quizlet/Anki*? Not yet, hopefully that is coming.

*Anki–oh, anki. You are a lovely tool. Spaced repition is the real deal in the science of learning. Sadly I am using all of my motivation to try and learn Irish–I am out of bandwidth to learn you too. There are lovely youtube videos explaining how to use it XXXXX. There is even a cheater iphone app that you can input like quizlet. XXXXXX Any of you true computer literate folks should use anki–and then use Forvo to input the sounds of the words as well—and then make a deck for the rest of us –ha ha–and then come over to my house and put it on my phone for me :).

XX Meán Fómhair

I suck today—didn’t even listen to Irish news

XX Meán Fómhar

Caibidil a Dó

https://quizlet.com/835492707/caibidil-a-do-ghuna-flash-cards/?i=bhsad&x=1jqt

ceadaithe	approved
a luaithe	as soon
maidir le cosc	in relation to prohibition
i bhfeidhm	in force
boise	palm
d’airigh	felt
i ngreim inti	in her grip
i mbaclainn	in barriers
ba mhó	most
a cholainn	his body
fonn ort a meáchan a chailleadh	desire weight to lose
ar mhaithe le faoiseamh a fháil	for the purpose of getting relief
tuiscint	understanding
dar leis siúd	according to those
ré	era
ná gurbh eisean	nor was he
imeartha	playing
thar	over
a thugadh	was given
síob dó	ride (was given) to him
le sruth	downstream
dúr	stupid
go géar	sharply
go gearr	shortly
go gairid	shortly
go himpíoch	persuasively
ag casachtach	coughing
ag sraothartach	sneezing
sraoth	series
go n-iompódh	that would turn
thathail	happened
amhail is go	as if
bolgam	stomach
údar náire	disgraceful
ag teastáil go gear	urgently needed
fág seo	leave this
bíodh foighne	have patience
go stadach	steadily
a shroich	which arrived
ní hamháin	not only
ar fónamh	serving
imeartha	playing
náirithe	humiliated
báire	goal keeper
ciasúr	scissors
de thimpiste	by accident
impím ort fanacht	i beg you to stay
go dtarlóidh	that will happen
mo náire thú	(my) shame on you
ar mhuin na muice	on the pig’s back
tríd chuige	through to him

Well that list seems even longer….. To be fair, the chapter was longer. An hear is the beauty of reading a kid book. Did you think that you would learn the word for “fart”? The fabulous sentence “Tá boladh bréan ó bhromanna mo dhearthár” is just not in a lot of grammar exercises. Or how about the sentence with “the snot exploded”? It certainly helps me remember both “snot” and “exploded”

XX

Tá mo pháistí tinn. Beidh mé tinn freisin. Ach, anois tá fhios agam na focail “ag casachtach” agus “ag sraothartach”.

XX

Ní a lán obair le mo Gheailge. Inniu leigh mé beagan Manchán Magan. Is é an údar go léamh mé nuair taestíonn inspiration do mo Ghaeilge a dhéanamh.

XX Déireadh Fómhar

Tá sé “déireadh” fómhar ach anseo tá sé te fós. Ach cúpla doleog ag titim. Tá an aimsir meabhar aige.

XX

Caibidil a trí

Bhí an olá shúil ag at ina cheann fearg	were both eyes swelling in his head with anger
ag gclúdach leis	the cover with it
rósanna fuaite air	roses sewn on it
B’éigean	had to, it was necessary
cé gur	although, even though
suáilleach	beautiful
go díreach	directly
Bhí an olá shúil ag at ina cheann fearg	were both eyes swelling in his head with anger
náire	shame
go hiondúil	normally
tríd an scipéad	through the script
tharraing D anáil dhomhain isteach	drew D a breath deep in
ag teastáil	traveling
ar ndóigh	of course
a chlúdach	to cover
éiríonn leis thú a mhealladh	rises only to seduce you, he manages to seduce you
ar fad thall ansin	all over there
anonn	over-to the other side
ag drogallach	reluctantly
cuideoidh mise leat	I will help you
go díocasach	eagerly
a réimse	his field
caoineacháin	mourning
iontas air	surprise (on) him
deoir a shileadh	to shed a tear
a bhí cumtha aige	which he had
a chlaonadh chun aontú leis	inclined to agree with him
in ann bogadh	able to move
ag síneadh	signing
go muiníneach	confiding
tá mé ag ceapadh go bhfágfaidh mé é	I’m thinking I’ll leave it
ag teastáil uaidh	he needs
as do mheabhair	out of your mind
maith go leor	very good
bíodh ceann agat	have one
an lug ar an lag	the weak on the weak
teastóidh	will need
go múinte	politely
B’fhada	it was long
bhrostaigh	hurry up, hurried up
a shroich	which arrived
luigh	lie down
ar a éadan	on his face
fógraí	advertisements
ar an gcéad céad	on the first
faoi na híomhánna	about the images
d’ailt	your articles
an-chosúil	very similar
a raibh cuma beagán cantalach orthu	who seemed a little irritable
de chumhráin	of perfume
sáite	stuck
a raibh siad gearrtha	which they had cut
an ghalántacht	the elegance
an áilleacht	the beauty
an fhoirfeacht	the perfection
i bhfolach	hidden
d’fhógair go soineanta	announced vaguely
fad a bhí siad ag imirt	while they were playing
ag lonrú	shinning
mar a bheadh ór ann ó íochtar na leapa	as if there were gold from under the bed
go grinn	wittily
fáithim	i get
greim	bite
deis	opportunity
nach raibh aon leon cainteach ann arbh é Íosa é i ndáiríre	that there was no talking lion that was really Jesus
na turais	the trips
cé go ndúirt	though said
bhí an oiread sin feirge	there was the amount (so much) anger
cumhachta	power
ar aon nós	anyway
B’in an uair	it was the time
ar an gcúdach	an the cover
faic	nothing
bhí an chuma	it seemed
greim a choinneáil	grip to keep (hold on)
é náirithe	it is embarrassing
níl sé ceart	it is not right
ar an gceád dul síos	firstly
gáirsiúla	obscene
díomá	disappointment
ar aon nós	anyway
ar iasacht	fishing
tógadh	take, taken, raised
sa chás seo	in this case
ná fíneáil dá mbeifeá mall á tabhairt ar ais	or a fine if you were slow in returning it
go hiondúil	normally
amú arís	normally
an lá áirithe	the particular day
bhí cuma mhíshuaimhneach	looked/appeared uneasy
nuair atá fios maith acu gur ag seafóid chainte atá siad	when they know very well that they are talking nonsense
de do leithéidse	of your land??
amhail	such as
eachtrannach	a foreigner
faoina anáil	under his breath
go tromchosach	heavily
go bun	to the bottom
dúirt mé leat gan do bhéal a oscailt faoi	I told you not to open your mouth about it
go dian	hard

https://quizlet.com/837978030/caibidil-a-tri-ghuna-flash-cards/?i=bhsad&x=1qqt