Streaming Scots Gaelic: How I’m Learning My Dream Language on the Web

Here’s a List of the Online Resources I’m Using to Learn Scots Gaelic!

One of the strange quirks of working on longer-form essays and stories is the long amounts of time during which I’m doing something, but I’m nowhere close to sharing it. It’s exciting for me to see things coming together, but there’s nothing to particularly publish. It’s like learning a language — far before you can speak it with anyone, there’s a ton of work to learn vocabulary, syntax, and other technicalities about it. On a related note, I’ve been trying to learn Scots Gaelic (and a couple of other languages as well, but that’s a longer story!).

Now, of course I know this is no way to become fluent, but it’s a great way to get started when money is tight and a trip to Scotland for a couple of years for an immersive experience is out of the question!

It all started with this video.

If you’re not familiar with struthless’ work, now is a great time to get to know him. He’s going through the alphabet in a series called “The A to Z of Weird Creative Rabbit Holes”. His content was already amazingly entertaining, but this stuff has ascended to the realm of riveting — in addition to transformative. So far the series has included videos on Art (in Spaaaace), Branding, and even Emoji, but the video that got me hooked on DuoLingo is the one linked above, about Gamification.

After Darren and I watched this, for my birthday, I got myself a paid subscription to DuoLingo.

DuoLingo is, essentially, a game to learn language. Is it the best language learning device out there? Probably not, but it’s one of the more popular. I already knew some people on it, and Darren decided he wanted to learn Spanish, so as a birthday gift I got a group, paid subscription in the hopes it would encourage me to use it daily. So far, I’ve used it 113 days in a row. Not bad for someone who claims to be terrible about setting up good habits. (By the way, struthless has an amazingly inspirational video on the 7 Habits of Highly Miserable People in his series, but I digress).

I’m taking lessons in several languages — to name a few I’m refreshing the Latin I learned in high school, re-learning the Spanish they tried to teach me in elementary school in addition to learning the Scots Gaelic I should have tried learning when I was living in Scotland. It ends up — I really enjoy learning languages and vocabularies.

I was talking to one of my friends during a Dungeons and Dragons game last night and mentioned I was learning Gaelic, and he said that learning Gaelic was so ‘on-brand’ for me he found it hilarious. He then asked if there are like 10 people who speak it and I assured him, and can assure you — there are many, many more. There are also a ton of resources I’ve found so far to support my learning of it — if you know of others, please let me know!

DuoLingo encourages me daily by quests and games, and ALSO a little cheeky owl who makes me feel guilty if I don’t open up the app.

Anyway, a lot of people are complaining about DuoLingo right now, about as many as are praising it. I don’t have the expectation that this app alone will make me fluent, nor do I allow myself to get too caught up in the competitive nature of it (that can take away some of the focus on the important lessons to learn). Instead, what I’m hoping for is having something that allows me to continually expose myself to the language and words, and that will remind me to find other resources to support my learning.

Scots Gaelic is still learned, used, and cherished by many — me included! If you want to learn this language, here are some resources I’m using — let me know what has helped you if I’ve missed any!

A bheil Gàidhlig agad? Tha mi ag ionnsachadh Gàidhlig!

YouTube / Video

Gaelic with Jason

Gaelic with Jason is an amazing resource. Jason is personable, knowledgeable, and makes learning Gaelic both fun and accessible. He tells stories in it, he geeks out with it, he uses the Witcher to teach it, and he explains things like grammar and spelling.

He’s so good at Gaelic that another one of my favorite channels, about Scottish history called “Scottish History Tours”, recommends his courses and learning from him. If you’re interested in Scottish history in addition to Scots Gaelic, Bruce’s channel is a great, fun one — never a dull video! If you ever want Bruce to take you on a personalized tour — he does that, too!

Speak Gaelic — BBC Scotland (BBC Alba)

BBC Scotland has a series that is dedicated to teaching Gaelic, too! There’s a ton packed into each video — from lessons to conversations with other learners to explorations of Scotland. There is also a companion podcast. It also has a companion website.

Laurenrhiannon’s Channel

This channel supplies a Daily word in Scots Gaelic. This channel is an absolute treasure — Laurenrhiannon gives the word, repeats it several times with its spelling on the screen, and explains its usage. A great vocabulary expander!

Speaking Our Language

Another show from the BBC (an older one, by the looks of it!) focusing on teaching Scots Gaelic. I just discovered this one while pulling resources together for this article, but I already like what I see!

Podcasts / Audio

Litir do Luchd-ionnsachaidh (Letter to Gaelic Learners)

This is a series of letters written for those learning the Gaelic language, and is for those with intermediate skill. I’m getting much better at listening to this great podcast with presenter Roddy MacLean.

Beag air Bheag

Beag air Bheag (‘Little by Little’) — Several seasons of a program designed to teach Scots Gaelic!

Coffee Break Gaelic — Learn Scottish Gaelic on your Coffee Break

Teacher Susanna and her student Mark have created a podcast that is like a coffee break with a friend helping you to speak Scottish Gaelic. I just discovered this one and already love it! It’s updated semi-weekly and is available on Apple Podcasts.

Apps

DuoLingo

Here’s where it started for me — DuoLingo! A gamified version of learning a language that I’ve found to be both fun and inspirational when it comes to practicing. My only gripe is that there’s not a talking feature for Gaelic.

Mango

Mango is another language learning app, and I’ve just been playing around with it today while writing this article. I like the way it’s introduced the Gaelic concepts, and I especially like the talking feature where I can overlay my voice over a native speaker’s! I’ll be putting this one more through it’s paces — if only I had the budget to add it to my Gealic resources arsenal!

Text

LearnGealic.Net and SpeakGaelic.scot

The companion site to BBC Scotland’s Learn Gaelic Series. It has reference resources such as a dictionary, thesaurus, and bits on grammar. It also has a list of available courses — especially those in Scotland, but also some international as well!

Am Faclair Beag

A quick and useful Gaelic to English dictionary!

Scots Gaelic: A Brief Introduction

Available on the internet archive, this introductory text is a very brief overview.

Web Resources

The American Scottish Gaelic Society

A website with learning resources, distance learning, and learning communities for Scottish Gaelic!

Google Translate

You bet Google Translate includes Scots Gaelic!

Paid Web Resources

Italki

I haven’t tried this resource yet but I’m excited to once I get some more Gaelic under my belt. This is a way to take lessons with those who speak Gaelic! There are many, many languages available — and Scots Gaelic has two teachers available!

I am so grateful there are so many resources available to learn Scots Gaelic on the internet, and I’m excited to explore them as I learn this language that means so much to me. If you’re looking to learn Gaelic, I hope this list helps you — and if you know of resources I’ve missed, let me know so I can add them!

Thank you for reading! (Tapadh leibh airson an leughadh)