Online Resources

The BBC's online course. Each lesson gives a few phrases, then a bit of explanation, and some sample conversations. You can listen to all of it.

Format: 20 video series originally for TV, from the 1970s, accompanied by vinyl/cassette plus a book that is available through Amazon and a photocopied PDF download

Can Seo is a fun series that uses a combination of minimalist in-studio set pieces plus footage from the islands of native speakers using different dialects (the 'course dialect' is that of Skye). There are some 'cultural' interludes in the show that are mostly interesting from a historic point of view but can be safely skipped if you are Scottish or have lived here a while. In addition to these features, it shows some spelling of unfamiliar words in both simple phonetics and correct Gaelic, at which point the viewer is invited to "Can Seo". The lesson material is then reinforced with an on-going soap opera entirely in Gaelic. The course is fast paced and covers a lot of grammatical ground in a short space of time, where other courses concentrate on vocabulary. While, it appears to be excellent material, to get the best out of it, you will need to use the book and the audio materials as well and not rely solely on the videos. A new student should be warned, however, that Can Seo pre dates the 1980's modernisation and there are some subtle difference between modern Gaelic and what is presented (e.g. Can Seo uses both grave and acute accents).

Guestimated Level on completion: Grammatically up to A2, vocab up to A1

Lèirmheas le Ionatan. Mòran taing, a bhalaich!

The BBC's learning game. It's good to practice some basic vocabulary in a fun way. I started in Colin's house in the hall, with Parts of the Body. For some of the games you should have a faster computer than I have though, but I guess that won't be too much of a challenge...

You will need a Flash emulator to play.

Duolingo is an online language learning platform. There's a Scottish Gaelic course available that was created by volunteers.

Gaelic with Jason is a YouTube channel with Gaelic lessons in it. There are multiple series to choose from, so you can follow story-driven teaching or get some information on how the grammar works - whichever works best for you! You can also book lessons with Jason if you want.

Format: 60 lesson series of flash-card-style material with cartoons and audio plus speaking practice.

LearnGaelic Beginner's Course (LGBC) is not a video series at all and appears to be aimed at children. That said, while child-like it is not too childish for a rank beginner to take on as an adult. The material in each lesson is presented in a very straight forward manner through a series of flash-card style web pages that progressively build from single words to sentences to a speaking (listen then repeat) section and ultimately a quiz to test your knowledge. The quizzes are blindingly easy to pass (70%) if done immediately after the lesson. However, what might make this course attractive to even an adult learner is how easily it can be adapted into a set of Anki cards for use in Spaced Repetition (though do not share your deck online as the material, while free, is copyright). With 60 lessons the course covers a lot of ground but at a very comfortable pace. The mummy/daddy references are a bit annoying for an adult as are the kids voices in the speaking-practice section. Children's voices are never the best for learning a language as the tones are often harsh and the annunciation is not always as clear as an adult. The children's voices in LGBC are no exception. Mercifully they are restricted to only some of the speaking-practice sections and tend not to be used for the flash-cards themselves.

Guestimated Level on completion: A2

Lèirmheas le Ionatan. Mòran taing, a bhalaich!

Format: 18 video series originally for TV, from the 1990s, accompanied by a book that is available through Amazon

Speaking Our Language (SOL) is an update on the Can Seo format and follows a very similar patters of a presenter giving the main points (on location this time and not in the studio), some native speakers and a soap opera (Aig An Taigh - At Home) about a family moving (presumably from the Islands) to Glasgow. There is not so much in the way of the cultural interludes that Can Seo has. The pacing of material in SOL is slower than Can Seo and it takes until Series 2 to reach the level of grammar taught by only lesson 12/13 in Can Seo. On the other hand, there is a greater breadth of vocabulary taught instead. A potted version of SOL is available on the LearnGaelic website, which presents some of the material in a text-format with audio clips. This means that comprehensive coverage of a lesson can be achieved by watching the full video on YouTube and reviewing it again on LearnGaelic (which only includes the relevant sections of the video and cuts out most of the presenter speaking English). SOL is a more gentle introduction to Gaelic than Can Seo, but possibly feels a bit too slow at times.

The videos are also available on YouTube.

Guestimated Level on completion: A1

Lèirmheas le Ionatan. Mòran taing, a bhalaich!

An online course that is a bit more grammar-oriented, and also provides sound. If you have problems with their programming, here's a direct link to the lessons.