Hanafin will not reconsider Gaelscoil decision

EDUCATION Minister Mary Hanafin has rejected calls to withdraw a directive that pupils of all-Irish schools should be taught English from the second term of junior infants.

The policy issued to schools in the summer is the subject of a judicial review likely to be heard in the High Court in the coming months.

It means that Gaelscoileanna and Gaeltacht schools can no longer delay English classes for pupils until senior infants or first class, which most of them currently do in a practice known as early immersion.

The Gaelscoileanna organisation has called for the directive to be withheld until research on the effects of immersion are carried out.

But Ms Hanafin told the Seanad yesterday that such research would take eight years as it would have to track a child’s progress from junior infants through to sixth class.

“We also expect every school in the country to teach Irish from the beginning, but it’s set in the curriculum that children must be taught in both languages from the start of primary school,” she said.

“If I thought the Irish language would suffer, I wouldn’t be doing this. We know there are kids coming into Gaelscoileanna with no language skills and we can’t deny them from the beginning,” Ms Hanafin said.

Independent Senator Rónán Mullen said it was not too late to have research done on the impact of immersion on English literacy and that the Gaelscoileanna are happy to accept whatever results would emerge.

“International research shows that there’s no disadvantage where there is an immersion approach in the first few years, but there has been no research in Ireland,” he said.

Studies in countries like Canada, where some children receive early immersion in French, or parts of Spain where other languages are also taught, show that children catch up on any shortfall in the second language by the end of primary school.

Ms Hanafin’s own advisory body, the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, told the minister earlier this year that schools should be allowed choose their own policy on immersion until detailed research can be completed.

The controversial directive would mean that Gaelscoileanna must teach junior infants English from the term beginning next January, although it allows a year’s grace for any schools with a long-standing immersion policy.

However, the High Court last week granted a temporary injunction preventing the new rules being implemented until a full judicial review has taken place. It was sought by Gaelscoil Mhic Easmainn in Tralee, Co Kerry, Gaelscoil Nás Na Rí in Naas, Co Kildare, and patronage body An Foras Pátrúnachta.