Junior Cert: Some dialect difficulties in full Irish day

It was a full day of Irish for around half the 55,000 Junior Certificate students taking the subject at higher level yesterday.

While some may have taken issue with the difficulty of Donegal-Irish dialects on one listening comprehension, Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI) subject spokeswoman Ruth Morrissey said all major dialects need to be examined to be fair to students from all parts of the country.

She thought the inclusion of a comprehension based on an Irish translation of the Diary of A Wimpy Kid novels was modern and in keeping with what young people read. While vocabulary in an article about a green city may have been unfamiliar, she thought the questions about it were accessible.