Learn Irish Premium. A Functional & Fun App to Learn Irish Gaelic
by Paul Wilks
Dec 8, 2011 10:06 AM –
Install
Learn Irish Premium is a functional and fun language application that lets you gradually learn some basic words and phrases in Irish Gaelic. It’s extremely easy to use, with playable audio files to help you understand how a word or phrase is pronounced, and there are both spellings and phonetic spellings to help with comprehension.
Price: Free for ad-supported version, $2.50 for Lite+ and $5.65 for Premium ($4.99 On Sale in AndroidTapp Store!)
Tested on: HTC Desire HD
Content Rating: Everyone
Pros & Cons:
Pros
- Carefully spoken words for correct diction!
- Good range of phrases!
- Great starting point to learn more about the Irish language!
- Spellings!
Cons
- Graphics in the app are quite simplistic.
Features:
Learning Irish Premium is a superb starting point to learn and comprehend Irish Gaelic. Whether you’ve wanted to learn the language itself, or just fancy learning a few useful words and phrases of the language to expand your linguistic horizons, this is a great solution.
The main menu presents you with a series of easy tabs; Numbers, Days, Months, Colors, Verbs, Phrases, Questions, and Halloween. There is also a quick link to the developers website. Under each of these tabs you are presented with another featuring words/phrases related to that subheading. So, under ‘Days’ for example you get Monday through to Sunday buttons. Pressing one of the buttons does two things; firstly the spelling of the word is is played beneath (both the correct spelling and the phonetic spelling, i.e. how you pronounce the word. At the same time, the word is audibly spoken so you can hear how it is pronounced. As far as controls and functionality is concerned, that’s about it. It’s simple, but if you repeat the word back to yourself then the app provides a good platform for all learning types (some people learn better from reading, some from listening and others from performing the task itself).
The content is very good here too. Numbers will more or less allow you to count as high as you like and also features ordinal numbers: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. Days, Months and Colors are all relatively self-explanatory while Verbs are more of an explanation as to how verbs are spoken and formed. There are a set of very basic phrases such as ‘Hello’ and ‘How are you?’. Questions gives another level; simple What?, When?, How? etc. through to ‘Which of them’ and ‘Where from’. While these are very basic, it will at least look like you have a fundamental understanding. Halloween is obviously a seasonal addition (the version I’m testing is from 27th October) but includes some cool related words such as Pumpkin and Candy.
Now, the app isn’t going to turn you into a fluent speaker of the Irish language but it is a genuinely great starting point that you should definitely try out if you’re interested. There are actually 3 versions of the app; there is an Ad-supported version of the Lite Plus Version, then there’s the Lite Plus version itself, then there is the Premium version tested here. You can also find an app by the same developer called Learn Irish: The Quiz.
http://youtu.be/4iB9UWuBFmE
Watch on Mobile
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Learn Irish Premium – Splash screen
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Learn Irish Premium – Menu
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Learn Irish Premium – Phrases
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Learn Irish Premium – Phrases 2
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Learn Irish Premium – Questions
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Learn Irish Premium – Numbers
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Learn Irish Premium – Numbers alt
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Learn Irish Premium – Days
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Learn Irish Premium – Halloween
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Learn Irish Premium – Verbs
Usefulness:
If you are looking to learn the language, this is a great starting point for getting to grips with various words and phrases. It might even serve as a good taster for you to decide if you want to learn the language to a greater extent.
Ease of Use:
The app is insanely easy to use, the menu and words are laid out very simply and everything works very well. There’s never a case of getting lost or confused in app.
Frequently Used:
Obviously this depends heavily on you, the user, and how much you want to learn the language. I imagine for best results, you would have to use it on a daily basis to learn as much as you can form the app.
Interface:
The interface is remarkably basic, and I could argue that the aesthetics are perhaps the only thing that let the app down. Everything is functional, but the framework is very very basic in its graphics.