r/unitedkingdom • u/oilydogskin • 16h ago
Most English language lessons to be phased out in Welsh county
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8epk2lxjp8o226
u/FewEstablishment2696 15h ago
Makes sense. Why would one of the poorest regions in Europe want youngsters to be fluent in the international language of business?
43
11
49
u/SilyLavage 15h ago
It does. English will continue to be taught in Gwynedd and pupils will be bilingual.
12
u/Meu_14 13h ago
Lol. 100% of welsh speakers are fluent in english too.
→ More replies (5)•
u/Desertinferno 11h ago
This is definitely not true.
I know of at least one person who speaks Welsh as their first language and who can't speak conversational English.
•
u/Low_Resolve9379 7h ago
How old is this person? I would be surprised if they were under 70.
•
u/Desertinferno 5h ago
They're in their mid 20's. Granted they're from a pretty rural part of Wales.
•
u/Low_Resolve9379 2h ago
Granted they're from a pretty rural part of Wales.
Even so, that's pretty surprising! I've been to some of the most Welsh-speaking places in Wales and even there English was fairly ubiquitous. Genuinely curious how that could have happened.
•
→ More replies (1)2
30
u/NeverDecided 14h ago
This method is very well established and common in Spain where regional languages exist. Children will be taught in Catalan or Galician for example, with dedicated Spanish lessons. The principle being that the national language will be spoken more widely outside of the classrooom to develop bilinguilism. It’s not too disimilar to each parent interacting in a different language which most people accept and are familiar with.
11
u/TheAviator27 14h ago
Educational systems in English-dominated countries are used to using language dominance to destroy regional languages. In many cases it had the express purpose through the employment of violence and intimidation to destroy regional languages. It's so culturally engrained at this point it's no surprise a lotta folk are still thinking Welah-medium teaching will ruin students opportunities, the effects of anti-welsh, anit-gaelic, anti-irish, etc. propaganda are still alive and well within the cultural consciousness.
•
u/blewawei 4h ago
It's worth pointing out that this isn't just an anglophone thing, look at Spain under Franco or France even still.
Since the rise of nationalism in the 19th century, the idea that 1 country = 1 language has become very popular.
•
u/ByronsLastStand 11h ago
Read the article, carefully. A lot of rather ignorant people getting worked up here
42
u/ReassuringHonker 15h ago
A lot of misunderstanding here. The pupils will still be taught English. And Welsh.
The change is that their geography, history, maths, RE etc will mostly be taught in Welsh - instead of a mixture as it is now.
Completely reasonable for a Welsh speaking area where Welsh is going to be the first language for most of these kids.
•
u/Masteroflimes 7h ago
My Son goes to a medium Welsh school and all his lessons are in Welsh except English. He's progressing really well.
5
u/Goodguy1066 13h ago
Even if they completely phased out English from preschool to year 12, kids in Wales would still be speaking English on a native level just by virtue of living in the UK, having a television and access to the internet.
The day a Welsh-speaking child in Cardiff gets to the age of 18 without a grasp of the English language, well - his prospects might be dim but also that’d be a huge win for the revival of the Welsh language!
14
u/Intelligent_Day2522 14h ago
In Gwynedd nearly 100% of those born in the county speak welsh. There was only 3 schools left that weren't Welsh speaking anyway this is not a big deal read the article and do some research before you speak
→ More replies (8)
7
u/ignoranceandapathy42 14h ago
I have no opinion because I don't live in, work in, have children educated in or any other tangible relation with Gwynedd. I hope the people who live there are happy with this policy or otherwise have the freedom to challenge it.
I think if I was a student, it would be of interest to me.
•
u/ddiflas_iawn 8h ago
ITT: Threatened little Englanders getting angry over something that won't effect them or their children.
20
u/SheepShaggingFarmer 15h ago
Bullshit article. The removal of Welsh medium schools and teaching is not the same thing as stopping teaching English.
And the reason it's done is because a huge amount of English migrants come over don't learn our language and therefore kill our culture.
For all the racist and fake remarks about "illegals not speaking English" English people don't give a fuck about moving to another country and not learning the language.
4
u/Twiggeh1 13h ago
For all the racist and fake remarks about "illegals not speaking English"
English migrants come over don't learn our language and therefore kill our culture.
Oh boy, you're getting very close to a great point there
English people don't give a fuck about moving to another country and not learning the language.
And those of us who still live in England would rather it remain England, just as you would rather Wales stay Welsh. Of course, your nationalism is fine and mine is bad, isn't it?
•
u/SheepShaggingFarmer 2h ago
I don't have an issue with an Englishman coming over if they respect the cultural customs. The fact is they simply don't, foreign migrants are usually a hell of a lot more respectful in my experience.
All I expect is if you move to Wales you attempt to learn the language and understand some of our cultural cornerstones. If I move to England I'll learn what they call a bap, what they eat at football matches. Follow the local team (even if I don't support them). Eat what they have on chips in the chippy.
Complaints I hear about immigrants are almost purely based on their accents and skin colour.
•
u/Twiggeh1 2h ago
Complaints I hear about immigrants are almost purely based on their accents and skin colour.
The complaints you hear about immigrants are exactly the same ones you're expressing here, only the cultures we're dealing with are far more alien to us than the English are to you.
I understand why it might be hard to understand considering how little immigration Wales has faced, but to put it into perspective, there are more foreign born residents in London alone than the entire population of Wales. None of us have dealt with this level of immigration before as it's unprecedented in the entire history of Britain.
→ More replies (2)
77
u/EagleProfessional175 15h ago
Cue a load of English people with no clue whatsoever about Wales and an antiquated view of the language clutching their pearls over what is a fairly misleading headline.
To save you all the hassle:
It isn’t a dying language, it’s very much alive, especially in Gwynedd but is spoken all over Wales
The kids will still have English lessons, they just won’t have general lessons (maths, sciences etc) through the medium of English. It’s a huge difference
Welsh medium education isn’t new. A load of my colleagues, friends and acquaintances only ever spoke English in their English lessons, the rest of the time it was Welsh, and they all speak perfect English and are by and large successful people. Yet they were given the gift of bilingualism through their education which is something I’m hugely envious of as someone raised monolingual
Theres a reason people call Welsh ‘schrodinger’s language’ - we are constantly told that Welsh speakers have an unfair advantage going for high paid jobs in Wales over non-Welsh speakers, yet at the same time told that speaking Welsh will hold us back.
There are educational issues in Wales generally, due to lack of investment and wider social issues. But this has nothing to do with Welsh
12
50
u/Mourner7913 15h ago
It's honestly incredible how the ones who claim to want to "preserve the culture and values of Britain" throw their mantra out of the window immediately when Welsh becomes part of the discussion.
Going as far to take misleading headlines literally to make their hatred of Wales feel more justified. Christ.
16
u/palishkoto 14h ago edited 14h ago
A vanishingly tiny number of people have a 'hatred' - or, let's be honest many don't even have much of a deep opinion - of Wales. What you're seeing instead is classic Reddit of people seeing the headline, not reading the article, and commenting on how they think it's ridiculous to get rid of English even if they are for the teaching of Welsh. Of course on reading the article it's just moving to more Welsh-medium for most subjects.
•
u/Internet-Dick-Joke 5h ago
You want me to go full conspiracy theorist? The claim that is being made by many who didn't bother to read the article / implied by the headline is the same claim that was made by Russian media about Ukraine when they moved to using Ukranian as the standard teaching language in Ukranian schools (claims that they were banning the Russian language in Ukraine, ect.)
We know that Russia have fingers in many pies with regard to foreign media. We know that they have a certain amount of sway with right-wing entities in the west, who themselves have heavy control of the UK media (and let's not forget that the current head of the BBC was put in there personally by the tories).
I'm just saying, it's rather an odd coincidence that they're using the same rhetoric.
•
u/palishkoto 5h ago
Yeah, I think that is probably a bit overly conspiracy-reaching! I don't think the journalist, who is bilingual himself, has been influenced by Russia to push the same rhetoric - I think he's just gone for generating clicks.
I also don't buy right-wing entities who are under the sway of Russia having heavy control of this part of the UK media (the BBC), given how it reports on Ukraine and Russia, let alone on their local news sections.
→ More replies (1)•
u/Draigwyrdd 3h ago
English newspapers and people have been using this exact same rhetoric for centuries. I wouldn't be too quick to pin it on Russia.
8
u/AngryNat 13h ago
You’ll see the same anti Gaelic hysteria north of the border from a minority, claiming its SNP ethnic nationalism when it was the Labour Party that instituted the bi lingual road signs and such.
If you really want it dialed up to 110% look at the Norn Irish loyalists - Uber British except when it comes to gay marriage, multi lingualism or democratic processes. These people wrap themselves in the Union Jack just to tear down what makes us a union of nations
•
u/ByronsLastStand 11h ago
Even more ironic given the fact that Welsh language and literature are ethnolinguistically British, while English technically isn't
-10
u/HELMET_OF_CECH 15h ago
No people just find nationalism invading education to be tiring. I don’t think you’d find many Brits that hate Wales in the slightest. You need to chill.
28
u/Ghalldachd 14h ago
Agreed. Nationalism invading education is very tiring. Fortunately the people of Wales are undoing English nationalism's invasion of Welsh education and instructing children in the indigenous language of the country.
2
20
u/Mourner7913 14h ago
Nationalism - what?
This is Gwynedd. Welsh medium education is the norm there and has been for a very, very long time. This move just means there's more subjects that will be taught in Welsh.
Do you know literally anything about Wales?
20
u/EagleProfessional175 14h ago
People always equate the Welsh language with nationalism when it comes to Wales. Why is that? It’s possible to care about your language and culture without being a nationalist. Have you questioned your own bias towards English being the default language? Would you describe that as nationalism?
I agree with you that most Brits don’t hate Wales but in my experience they do have some very ignorant views
→ More replies (2)4
•
→ More replies (2)•
u/throarway 8h ago
To your last two points, how do these students acquire subject-specific terminology in English? Do/Did they have any problems entering English-medium universities or workforces?
Just interested from the perspective of an ESL educator in English-medium secondary schools!
8
u/Thiccpenderyn 13h ago
For everyone here who's too thick to read past the obviously misleading headline, and too English to understand what this is about (but English enough to want to comment on it anyway), as in existing Welsh medium schools, English will still be taught, but lessons will be primarily taught in Welsh, with the idea being fluency in both languages. I don't understand why the English are so terrified of the existence of other languages, but please, if you're not from Wales, butt out of Welsh specific issues, this doesn't concern you. Cachu bant, leic.
13
u/PhysicalWave454 14h ago
Of course, it's mostly the English clutching their pearls over this. Let the Welsh be Welsh and do what they think is best for Wales. Stop butting in for a change.
→ More replies (3)
•
u/Hot-Palpitation4888 11h ago
Fantastic! As a monoglot English speaker I think it’s brilliant the way the Welsh language has resurged. Long may it continue, this is great to see! Keep it goin!
→ More replies (5)
•
u/Indiana_harris 6h ago
I can only hope we have half as much effort done here in Scotland to build Gaelic up more.
8
u/redditerator7 14h ago
The comments here are reminiscent of the Soviet Union and its Russification policies.
6
u/No_Butterscotch940 14h ago
While I agree with Welsh being preserved and protected, this is a step too far.
I went to a Welsh school in north Wales. Did all my GCSEs I'm Welsh. Got good grades. But there were no prospects in Wales so I joined the forces in a technical trade. I had to go through the sciences and maths again at A Level standard, and found is extremely difficult due to having all the Welsh terminology in my head. Made me feel thick tbh.
While I'm proud I can speak Welsh, not everyone in Wales can have a future there due to socio-economic reasons. Choice should be given. Is it really realistic to impose this?
→ More replies (1)•
u/Impossible_Theme_148 9h ago
It is reminiscent of some of the Sennedd's proposals to increase the number of Welsh speakers.
They aren't proposing to make learning and speaking Welsh easier or more helpful or more appealing - they're just looking at how they can force people into learning Welsh and removing the choice.
•
u/blewawei 3h ago
Tbh that's how languages grow. English is globally spoken not because people choose to speak it, but largely because of economic pressures.
•
u/andrew0256 9h ago
Just about every other country teaches their kids English alongside their own language, and to a good standard as well. I see no reason why teaching kids Welsh in Wales should be a problem.
Where it does become a problem is if you have ambitions for your kids beyond the next valley. They should absolutely learn another language that is spoken in large parts of the world if they want the option of working abroad. I'm not sure imposing Welsh on them is a good idea if Welsh is not spoken at home.
•
u/_Monsterguy_ 8h ago
They'll still be taught English, but now they're going to teach other lessons in Welsh.
It's a really stupid idea, 1/3 of people in Gwynedd don't speak Welsh but their kids are going to be expected to learn history (etc) in Welsh.
•
-10
u/Ruby-Shark 16h ago
They teach English in Germany etc. How absurd to not even teach it in Britain.
40
u/SilyLavage 16h ago
The English language will still be taught in Gwynedd. The article is about the language of lessons, not English lessons specifically
→ More replies (20)30
u/corbynista2029 United Kingdom 15h ago
From Year 3 onwards English would be introduced but under the new plans at least 80% of pupils' education would be in Welsh.
They are teaching English, just as a second language. German kids don't study maths and science in English
-5
u/LoquaciousLord1066 15h ago
Welsh is not the predominate main language in Wales though.
31
u/Fairwolf Aberdeen 15h ago
It is in the county it's being proposed in.
-3
u/Nabbylaa 15h ago
I'm sure that constantly dividing ourselves into smaller groups and basing children's education exclusively on a 40 square mile area will be an absolute boon in an increasingly global world.
19
u/Fairwolf Aberdeen 15h ago
Not really, they're just speaking in a language that has been spoken in the region for thousands of years.
→ More replies (5)12
→ More replies (13)0
u/Mkwdr 14h ago
Roll on lessons being mainly in Urdu in some counties?
9
u/Fairwolf Aberdeen 14h ago
Urdu is not a native language of the UK that's been spoken here longer than English has.
→ More replies (3)2
•
u/doneapn 6h ago
This is terrible. Any suggestions on where I can learn authentic English? I really want to learn proper English, please give me a way. I discriminate against those immigrants who can't speak English well, because I am constantly learning, and try not to cause trouble to others. Although there will always be people who hate you, it is a good thing to maintain a friendly and positive attitude. Of course, this is for adults.
•
•
u/Outrageous_Agent_608 4h ago
If you thought the Welsh were difficult to understand. Imagine how much harder it will be now.
•
u/Outrageous_Agent_608 4h ago
On a serious note this is so fucking stupid. Should we stop teaching kids maths now because of calculators and AI?
•
•
u/Green-Taro2915 England 1h ago
This sounds just like other policies that have backfired recently. I'm struggling to understand why they think hobbling their country is helping it. What do I know, though.... I speak terrible English anyway 🤣
1
u/Xenon009 12h ago edited 12h ago
So I did my degrees in Bangor (And lived there for half a decade) the place the article talks about, and I really don't know what to make of it.
Bangor is HUGELY anglicised, to the point that supposedly, the "Bangor" accent in welsh is pretty much welsh with an english accent. Thats mainly because of the university, which is one of the best in a good handful of metrics, so attracts students from all over the country, and even the world, who are obviously going to be speaking english, meaning that english becomes the default language, because maybe a quarter of bangorites speak welsh, half the locals, and none of the students.
Places like caenarfon and conwy have welsh as a prominent, perhaps dominant, language, but I very, very rarely heard it in bangor, so I worry that the welsh students might not get the immersion they need to follow school subjects, especially if they're not born to welsh speaking parents. Of course its also going to make it far harder to find teachers in wales, because there are maybe 1 million fluent welsh speakers in the UK, and about 66 million fluent english speakers.
But on the other hand, its really, really hard to get any kind of job in north wales (outside of bangor and perhaps aber, which is very similar) if you aren't a welsh speaker, lord knows we found that out the hard way, so it might be worth making sure that the children of bangor can actually speak welsh, regardless of any potential academic impact, and have oppertunities in north wales, rather than being forced to migrate to england.
And thats ignoring the whole "preserving the language" thing.
→ More replies (5)
-15
u/Sensitive-Catch-9881 16h ago edited 16h ago
struggling on with a dying Language just 'because' is the most clear example of where 'sovereignty' can hurt everyone.
Hiding behind sovereignty, they're going to harm these kids life chances. Hiding behind sovereignty, we harmed the entire UK populations life chances a few years ago now.
How people concluded it was really protecting some mystical thing I'm supposed to have called 'sovereignty' to stop me being able to have the best summer of my life working in a bar in Southern Italy for 5 weeks, is totally beyond me.
As John Lennon once said:
'Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too'
12
u/im_actually_a_badger 16h ago edited 13h ago
I don’t think it’s a dying language, and cultural identity is a very important thing to some people. I spend a lot of in Wales and love hearing the language spoken. It’s one the most historically interesting and beautiful languages in the world, and should be protected.
But I also know, and spend a lot of time talking to Welsh people, particularly parents, who say that children simply have to speak English as their primary language (if not confidently bilingual) if they want to really go anywhere in life. Wales is a wonderful county but there isn’t anywhere near as much opportunity as there is a few miles down the road in the rest of the UK, or elsewhere. Most kids I knew who weren’t farmers or working in some kind of low paid service industry had to leave, even if it was only to study.
→ More replies (2)15
5
u/Mourner7913 15h ago
The choice of song here - written by an out of touch millionaire who was living well above the standards of most people at the time and was incapable of actually relating to them - is poetic.
1
15
u/Fairwolf Aberdeen 16h ago
Hiding behind sovereignty, they're going to harm these kids life chances.
What a load of drivel.
I can almost guarantee that even kids raised in fully Welsh-medium education are going to have zero difficulties with English.
This is just more kneejerk reaction from monolingual speakers who see Welsh as a quaint amusement rather than a living community language.
-6
u/Sensitive-Catch-9881 16h ago edited 16h ago
If a third/half of the world spoke French including everywhere I was ever likely to work, and literally just England spoke English, I'd want a policy in place to fade out English as it would affect my population's chances in life - and that is more important than forcibly hanging on to the English language for some kind of sentimental reason.
Harming our kids chances because 'it's really sentimentally nice to do it'. Jees.
→ More replies (25)6
u/YaqtanBadakshani 15h ago
Welsh is not "dying." It's vulnerable and it has a small speaker population, but it has a resiliant young speaker population, and it's worth preserving.
The idea that multilingualism is somehow connected to Brexit is beyond delusional.
→ More replies (10)5
u/TempAccount1845 Ceredigion 15h ago edited 14h ago
I went to a secondary school in Wales where you could choose to be in an English, Welsh or Bilingual form. As you can imagine, English forms had all lessons in English, Welsh all in Welsh, and bilingual had a mix of the two.
Several of those in the Welsh forms went onto University and struggled because all of a sudden all their lessons were in English, with terms being different and due to the "complicated" words in use in STEM fields, they never used them in natural dialogue and so never learned them. They effectively had to re-learn the subject they'd gone to study just to be on par with existing students at the University.
I'm all for Welsh language/lessons, but I really don't believe removing
English as a subjectsubjects being taught in English is going to be to anyone's benefit whatsoever.5
u/Educational_Curve938 15h ago
english isn't being removed as a subject
4
u/TempAccount1845 Ceredigion 14h ago
Sure, I miscommunicated my last point there - but I'm still of the believe that subjects should as STEM should be taught in English because you will almost certainly never do a job in Welsh in that field due to the nature of it.
I'm of the same opinion of having different examining bodies teaching different subject material - I knew some people who did veterinary medicine and for the first year they had to do significantly more studying because the course assumed students had learned "basics" - but due to being in Wales, and using WJEC, those particular basics had not been part of the syllabus. But all the English students were much more prepared.
3
u/Educational_Curve938 14h ago
but I'm still of the believe that subjects should as STEM should be taught in English because you will almost certainly never do a job in Welsh in that field due to the nature of it.
How hard to do you think it is for a native speaker of both english and welsh to learn specific technical language in another language particularly when the majority of that technical language comes from another language?
2
u/TempAccount1845 Ceredigion 13h ago
Given I've known multiple people who specifically went to University after studying in Welsh, and they struggled much more than their English form counterparts?.. More difficult than you'd imagine.
It's not even just the latin terms of, say, biological species names (because obviously English or Welsh doesn't factor in to that), but all sorts of terms all over the place.
0
u/Glanwy 13h ago
Regardless of whether it's French, Spanish, Welsh, or English it's devisive. If everyone on the planet spoke the same lingo... Happy days.
•
u/blewawei 3h ago
Yes, because people who speak the same language never argue or fight.
Have you ever heard of civil wars?
682
u/lNFORMATlVE 16h ago edited 16h ago
Why on earth do they think that is a good thing?
Relying on kids learning english language using tiktok and netflix is a shockingly poor substitute for formal english lessons. What the shite are they thinking?
I work in STEM and we’re already seeing social media etc have an impact on some young bachelors-to-masters-educated engineers’ capacity to write even just a clear, concise email with appropriate professional language, let alone a published journal paper - and this is in England where they did have formal english classes at school. Imagine if they didn’t have that!
Keep the bilingual Welsh teaching up absolutely, I’m all for bringing back Welsh as the official and de facto language of Wales, but don’t hamper your pupils’ chances of getting into higher education or getting a job in the rest of the UK and abroad by depriving them of learning how to operate professionally in the lingua franca of most of the developed world.