Some of the benefits of bilingualism and Gaelic Medium education include:
- Being bilingual helps children become more aware of language itself and how it works. A child speaking Gaelic will know that some nouns are masculine and feminine. This makes it easier to learn languages such as French and Spanish where the same rules apply.
- Having two languages offers many career opportunities.
- They are better readers, and generally find it easier to learn other languages.
- Children in Gaelic medium education (GME) can be fluent in two languages with advantages learning other ones.
- Having two languages can access different literatures and more ways of thinking and acting.
- Gaelic bilinguals have a better understanding of the wider Scottish cultural identity.
- Children exposed to different languages at an early age tend to be more focused at ‘multitasking’, than children who speak one language.
- Research shows that children educated through Gaelic are on par with or outperform children educated in one language.
Communication and Social Benefits
In this video, Joanna McPake speaks about the benefits of bilingualism, including the ability to access a wider range of information sources and the pleasure that derives from reading in another langauge. Wilson MacLeod explains how bilingualism can make us understand different cultural viewpoints better. And at the end, Scotty Mac Con Ulaidh, Ruaraidh Graham and Fiona Dunn tell us about the benefits they have had for themselves as a result of being bilingual, including personal relationships, learning about culture and history and self confidence in a multilingual world.
