Irish language: Over 15,000 primary pupils take part in scheme

Séamas Mac Eochaidh, from Gael Linn, said that St Malachy’s was one of 82 English-medium primary schools taking part in the initiative.

In total, nearly 15,000 pupils are involved in the Scoil Spreagtha scheme and more than 80 schools are on the waiting list for it, he said.

However Mr Mac Eochaidh said that there were concerns about the falling number of pupils studying languages, including Irish, for GCSE and beyond.

“We believe that a lot of that is that children don’t get the educational opportunities to learn a second language or to hear a second language or to see second language on a daily basis at the primary level,” he said.

“We believe that this work being done at primary level will boost GCSE numbers not just for Irish at GCSE but all languages.”

Funding for a primary school languages programme was axed almost a decade ago.

Mr Mac Eochaidh said that bilingual learning increased pupils’ enthusiasm for learning all languages.

“There’s been numerous examples of us being on a school visits where children have translated from one language to the other, back to the other, back to another language,” he said.

“We would say that the Irish language can be an initiator for that.

“Everybody feels like they’re on the same equal playing field, which obviously promotes that multicultural and multilingual classroom environment.”