Unfortunately Kilkenny lost the All-Ireland Hurling Final to Tipperary over the weekend and this phrase came to mind.
‘Beidh lá eile ag an bPaorach’ meaning ‘Power will have another day.’
It is pronounced ‘Beg law ella egg on bare-ach.’
The phrase comes from Irish history where a man with the surname, Power, tried a revolt and failed. It is often used for the phrase ‘Better luck next time.’
Today Kilkenny are in the All-Ireland Hurling Final against Tipperary in Croke Park, Dublin.
Kilkenny are the most successful team in hurling in Ireland because they have won the All Ireland Senior Championship Final thirty-six times. Not that I am biased with my Dad from Kilkenny and many a happy childhood memory of the black and amber flags flying proudly outside the houses as we drove through the county.
The nickname for the Kilkenny team are ‘The Cats’ and I wanted to teach the children an Irish phrase for the Final as we looked out for Grandma, Grandad and my Uncles in the stands supporting the Kilkenny Cats on the TV this Sunday afternoon.
‘Cill Chainnigh Abú’ is the Irish for ‘Kilkenny Forever.’
It is pronounced ‘Kil khyan-ee aboo.’
Hurling is an Irish game that is thought to date back to 3000 years ago. It is often referred to in Irish myths and legends. It was in 1884 and the formation of the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) that the formal set of rules evolved for the game of hurling that we see today. Hurling is a wonderful game to watch with the speed and skill of the players.
‘Iomáint’ is the Irish for ‘hurling’.
It is pronounced ‘um-awe-nch’.
These are the activities that I set up for my toddlers aged 3 and 1 in the week leading up to St. Patrick’s Day. This is a collection of ideas that you can use at home or in the classroom.
To develop their fine motor skills, I drew a large rainbow on paper and then encouraged the children to colour match the coloured stickers to the arches on the rainbow. The gold at the bottom is the Leprechaun’s gold according to the toddler.
2. Make rainbow toast
The toddlers loved getting involved and helping to make rainbow toast for breakfast. It’s really easy to make.
Mix food colouring with milk and paint it onto the bread. Toast the bread and you have rainbow toast. The toddlers loved this for breakfast. Although it was dry so we added butter once the bread was toasted.
3. Play ‘Where’s Larry?’
This book is the Irish version of ‘Where’s Wally?’ Larry is a leprechaun who is hiding around various locations in Ireland e.g. Croagh Patrick, The Giant’s Causeway. Toddler 3 loves looking for Larry and is still looking through the book in August. After reading the book, we hid our toy leprechaun and the toddlers loved looking for him in the living room.
4. Green water play
In the water tray, I added green water with coins and St. Patrick’s day confetti with horse shoes, shamrocks and hats. The toddlers enjoyed scooping up the confetti with the nets and putting them in cups. We did lots of counting of our treasure and comparing who had more and who had less.
5. St. Patrick’s Day sensory bin / tuff spot
The toddlers loved playing with the sensory bin . It was filled with green shredded paper which were hiding toy gold coins and chopped up gold beads from the Christmas decorations.
Toddler 3 loved hunting for the leprechaun’s gold and together we arranged the gold chains into order of size from longest to shortest.
Please note that children should always be supervised when playing with water or small objects.
As the children played , I dropped Irish words into the play e.g. ‘glas’ for ‘green’ (pronounced ‘gloss’). Teaching children a second language should not be hard especially if you are learning with them. Just keep introducing the words and then you can build up to phrases.
With St. Patrick’s Day fast approaching, now is the perfect time to learn a few words and phrases in Irish.
The Irish language (an Ghaeilge) can be very off putting due to it’s alphabet, rules and pronunciation but you can say that about any language, so don’t worry and just have a go.
With my children, I drop words or phrases into the conversation as they are playing. When I studied linguistics at university, it was called ‘code switching.’ For example ‘Look! The shamrock is glas (green).’
Here are the words or phrases that I will be bringing into the conversation as my children play. I have put the phonetic pronunciation in the brackets to help.
Glas (gloss) – Green
Seamróg (sham-rogue) – Shamrock
Ádh (awe) – Luck
Cleas (class) – Trick
Pota óir (putha ore) – Pot of gold
Boinn óir (bwin ore) – Gold coins
Bogha báistí (bowah bawsh-chee) – Rainbow
Leipreacán (leprechaun) – Leprechaun
Lá Fhéile Pádraig faoi mhaise duit (law aylah Pawrick fwee vosha gwitch) – Happy St. Patrick’s Day
Hello and welcome to my blog ‘Gaelic Mammy’.
I’m an experienced primary school teacher who would like to share my teaching ideas alongside the teaching of Irish to my two toddlers. I try to teach my children one Irish word or phrase a day based upon their play or interests. Come along on my journey and learn a bit of Irish too.
I’m on Instagram so feel free to follow me on ‘gaelic_mammy’
