Welsh language

Hello bloggers

In this blog I will taking a look at the welsh language and determining its value in the current primary education system.

Wales has many things to be proud of, it’s famous for a lot of things; Coal mining, welsh cakes, Tom Jones, Dylan Thomas, sheep, but what Wales should be most proud of is the welsh language, it derives from Gaelic, is over 1400 years old, and sounds beautiful, it has also stood the test of time, sort of.

Stats wales shows that the percentage of people that speak welsh in all but 3 local authorities has significantly decreased since between 2001 and 2011 and that number is still in decline. Although it is declining it is still mandatory in primary schools and is taught across Wales.

The Donaldson review states that ‘the Welsh culture is wholly dependent on transmitting the language to our young people’ which means that if we want to language to carry on it must be taught at a young age, Donaldson also outlines that he would like to see an increase in amount of people that both speak and use the welsh language, whilst I too would like to see it, I think it is an unachievable goal realistically speaking.

The welsh languages popularity is clearly on the decline and to see a noticeable change in that would require a radical change in not on the curriculum, but the whole schooling system, and I don’t believe this change is needed in the foundation phase. Wales is fantastic to learn about and the topic of Wales provides many opportunities for cross curricular learning, you can learn about the geography and history of wales, the poems and the music, the mining and the machinery, all of these are great examples of combing subjects and basing that around a single subject, I also believe that the language itself should be taught to a certain degree to try and spark an interest in the language, but then the child will be given an opportunity to further pursue the language when they get to secondary school where they are given more freedom.

Whitehouse, S and Jones, M (2017) agree with my point that it is important to have some understanding of welsh culture and the language it’s a great thing to be proud of, but we should not waste time trying to save a language that is arguably beyond saving, time is precious in primary education and that time could be spent teaching children literacy, although it could be argued that a child learning both welsh and English may even enhance their learning of English as they begin to understand things like mutations and dialects in language.

In conclusion I myself am proud of my heritage, especially being from the Rhondda Valleys, but when it comes to the language I can’t say I have much hope for it, although I suppose you must consider the fact that roughly 16% of the Rhondda Valleys actually speak the language so I may be biased.

References

Donaldson, G (2015) Successful Futures: Independent Review of Curriculum and Assessment Arrangements in Wales Available at: http://gov.wales/docs/dcells/publications/150225-successful-futures-en.pdf (Accessed 16th April 2018)

StatsWales (2011) Welsh speakers by local authority and broader age groups 2001 and 2011 census Available at: https://statswales.gov.wales/Catalogue/Welsh-Language/WelshSpeakers-by-LA-BroaderAge-2001And2011Census (Accessed 16th April 2018)

Whitehouse, S. and Jones, M. (2017) ‘Primary humanities: a perspective from Wales’ Education 3-13 45(3) pp.332-342