Patchy

Today was my very first lesson in Gaelic (Irish) with Patchy. We conducted the entire lesson in Gaelic. Patchy sent me a message ahead of time to tell me what items I would need for the lesson and what to expect. I also had the choice of which dialect I would like to learn. We had a LOT of fun! I let Patchy know in advance that I have dyslexia and poor vision, and these were absolutely accommodated and the lesson was wonderful. I would say that the main takeaways for me were immediately being able to speak Gaelic (albeit parroting my teacher) and slowly coming to understand phonemes, grammar concepts, (there are initial mutations in Gaelic) and words--in the target language, not by translating through my native language. Immersion Gaelic is the way to go. Patchy also provided me with homework for our next class. I'm so looking forward to it that I immediately bought a package of 5 more lessons in addition to the 5 I've booked! Thank you, Patchy!

I liked the pronunciation aspect, it was nice! Not having any idea of the words you're pronouncing however can be quite unsettling and confusing. I would like to repeat with Patchy because I know his Irish is spot on, but I'm still confused about what just happened.

Iontach, mar is gnách !

Iontach ar fad! :)

Patchy is a fantastic teacher. I can see a lot of progress over the months. It is especially very interesting to learn about the different pronounciations between Irish dialects, which is one of the biggest challenges in learning Irish in my opinion.

We followed a dialogue in turns to practice pronunciation. We also started the class with some Irish conversation practice. This is new to me. I had one class before with him and this time I felt more confident and less phased by the words that I did not recognise.