What is the Value of the Welsh Language in Primary Education?

Ellena Barnett - St20100668

What is the Value of the Welsh Language in Primary Education?

The debate of using the Welsh language to teach pupils within the classroom, has become present within recent years, with only a third of schools in Wales teaching pupils primarily in Welsh (Tickle and Morris, 2017). Under the recent education reform, Donaldson (2015) intends to have more children speaking Welsh to become ethical, informed citizens of Wales and the world.

For centuries, the Welsh language had been a vibrant, living medium of communication for the Welsh people, as the decades of the twentieth century rolled by the future well-being of the Welsh language was placed in considerable jeopardy, as the use of the English language swept through the world and other languages disappeared at an unprecedented rate (Williams and Jenkins, 2000). Since the 2011 census revealed that the proportion of people in Wales are able to speak Welsh fell from 21% (2001) to 19% (2011) (Morris, 2013) an imminent extinction of the Welsh language has been suggested across the country, these results came as a shock to many members of the Welsh community, considering more children are taught Welsh in the classroom, the Welsh language is displayed in the media and the government is keen to promote the language, many thought that more people than ever were speaking Welsh (Muir, 2013). Heini Gruffudd suggested that “people have been saying that Welsh would die out for hundreds of years, with all the pressures it has faced, its survival is a bit of a miracle”; Gruffudd goes further suggesting the problems for the Welsh language is that due to the struggling rural economy, young people are promoted to move to towns and over the border into England, as well as children speaking Welsh at school but English at home (Muir, 2013).

The establishment of a Welsh-medium education has been a longstanding campaign driven by parents across Wales, with the first Welsh school opening in 1956 (Jones, Coslett and Starss, 2017) as well as progress being made in the Education Act of 1988 for all children to learn the Welsh language (Welsh Government, 2009) it was suggested that the Welsh language could become a priority in the curriculum, however there are still stigma from parents who believe that if their child is taught in and to speak Welsh, they will be at a disadvantage to other children who are taught in predominantly English (Cosslett, 2017). Under the National Assembly for Wales, schools in Wales fall under five categories. The first being Welsh-medium where pupils in the Foundation Phase are taught through the medium of Welsh and at least 70% of the teaching in Key Stage 2 is taught in Welsh; the second category is ‘Dual stream’ where both Welsh and English is used in the day-to-day business of the school and to communicate with pupils; the third category is ‘Transitional’ where predominantly Welsh-medium is used alongside English; the fourth category is the dominant use of English with significant use of Welsh; and the fifth category is English-medium where English is the predominant language used and Welsh is taught as a second language (Jones, 2016). By giving the opportunity to access a range of schools within Wales shows how a parent is given a choice of how they want their child to be educated and through which language.

Within Donaldson’s (2015) education reform he expresses his intentions for the Welsh language within the curriculum, the discusses how the teaching and learning of Welsh is a priority for the Welsh Government, and that under the new curriculum reform the learning of the Welsh language will be compulsory to the age of 16. Donaldson’s intentions for the Welsh language is that every child in Wales will learn Welsh even if they attend an English-medium school, and they will learn the Welsh language from the age of 3 (2015). Donaldson suggest that an issue that may arise from learning and teaching Welsh is that it may not be fully accepted by parents and carers and many teachers, and that for the Welsh language to thrive children and young people’s confidence to use the language needs to be built up and used in activities and real-life situations, in and outside the classroom (2015).

In conclusion, for the Welsh language to thrive across Wales, children and young people, parents and carers and teachers alike should become accepting of the language and understand the benefits of being able to understand their ‘mother tongue’, as well as having a further understanding of the history of Wales and being able to value the Welsh language.

References

Cosslett, R, L. (2017). How sad that English-speaking parents fear their children being taught in Welsh. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/jun/22/sad-english-parents-afraid-children-taught-welsh (Accessed: April 2018).

Donaldson, G. (2015). Successful Futures: Independent Review of Curriculum and Assessment Arrangements in Wales. Welsh Assembly Government. Crown.

Jones, A., Coslett, T. and Starrs, S. (2017). The long struggle for the right to speak the Welsh and Irish languages. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/23/the-long-struggle-for-the-right-to-speak-the-welsh-and-irish-languages (Accessed: April 2018).

Jones, M. (2016). Welsh-medium education and Welsh as a subject. Available at: http://www.assembly.wales/research%20documents/rs16-048/16-048-english-web.pdf (Accessed: April 2018).

Morris, S. (2013). Welsh in decline: campaigners call for action as report highlights falling usage. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/aug/11/welsh-decline-campaigners-report-usage (Accessed: April 2018).

Muir, H. (2013). Fighting to save the Welsh language. Ymladd i achub yr iaith Gymraeg. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2013/jan/21/fighting-save-welsh-language (Accessed: April 2018).

Tickle, L. and Morris, S. (2017). ‘We’re told we’re anti-Welsh bigots and fascists’ – the storm over Welsh-first schooling. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/jun/20/storm-welsh-only-schools-minority-language (Accessed: April 2018).

Welsh Government. (2009). Welsh Language: History, Facts and Figures. Available at: http://gov.wales/topics/welshlanguage/publications/historyfactsfigures/?lang=en (Accessed: April 2018).

Williams, M. and Jenkins, G. (2000). Let's Do Our Best For The Ancient Tongue: The Welsh Language In The Twentieth Century, Cardiff: University of Wales.