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Rating: 
Summary: Confusing, but could be promising if they fix version 9.0.
Review: As someone who has gone throught O'Siadhall's Learning Irish and grew up in house with two native Connemara Irish speakers for parents. I also found the format very confusing. Where do you start? Where is the structure? I understand that they want to immerse you in the language as if you had just stepped off the bus at the village of Doire Iorrais in the middle of the gaelteacht, but that method only works for some people. How hard would it be to build a lesson structure in to the software so that users could approach it from a structured or non structured approach? Not very, I'm guessing. Add a few menus and some lesson plans. I also was very disappointed to find out the the writing software did not come with Irish script. I found it impossible to type anything with a fada correctly. This is one thing for which the company has no excuse. If you're going to sell and Irish computer course, you ought to be able to type easily in Irish with little or no effort. I believe that with some tweaking, this could very well be THE product for teachhing Irish, but until the weaknesses with regard to course structure are addressed, this will continue to be a peripheral tool for learners.
Rating: 
Summary: Not recommened for the beginner
Review: I believe this software is for intermediate/advanced Irish students. I started out with no knowledge of the Irish language and haven't made much progress since. It does have many phrases and excerpts from novels but there are no vocabulary lists which makes it very hard to learn. This program is confusing.
Rating: 
Summary: Not bad at all, I dare say.
Review: I can say best method of learning a foreign language may be to travel in a crowded bus! Perhaps you need some companions, like traditional books or tape based courses; neverthless , it can move to proficiency, and fluent speaking.
Rating:
Summary: The best Irish course
Review: I have been trying to learn Irish for a couple of years now. This is the fourth program I have tried. Finally, I found a program that gives me the correct pronunciation for each word (a big deal since Irish doesn't follow English phonetic rules). This CD gets you talking in sentences that you can actually use. The program is easy to use and comprehensive. I am very happy with this product.
Rating:
Summary: The best Irish course
Review: I have been trying to learn Irish for a couple of years now. This is the fourth program I have tried. Finally, I found a program that gives me the correct pronunciation for each word (a big deal since Irish doesn't follow English phonetic rules). This CD gets you talking in sentences that you can actually use. The program is easy to use and comprehensive. I am very happy with this product.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Learning Tool for Irish Gaelic.
Review: I have used Transparent Language programs for a number of years, and am very happy with the product.Since Gaelic Now! is a computer program, it is a good idea to spend a few minutes reading the manual or using the built in help file. The menues are clear, and the system is easy to use. In the Transparent Language system, you open a title on a CD. The text shows on the screen, along with a smooth English translation, a transliteration of the Irish text, and a grammatical analysis of each word and phrase. You can hear the phrases spoken at conversational speed, at slow speed, and word by word. Using your PC microphone, you can record yourself pronouncing the words, and compare your pronounciation with a native speaker's. Once you have the Transparent Language engine installed, you can purchase additional titles in many languages at beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels. I have used the system extensively for studying French and Spanish, and I also have titles in German, Italian, Russian, Latin, and Gaelic. At rebated price, this is an outstanding bargain for a great educational tool. But remember, this is a learning program, and you have to do your end of the work too. You can only get out of it what you put into it.
Rating: 
Summary: "Confusing........."
Review: This was the only (so far anyway) Irish Gaelic language program that I have been able to find. First, the main menu is confusing, it gives you no real idea where to begin. You click on something and you get a lot of lines of text with links to places on the disc, some of these links only bring up more text to tell you how to get there. I finally found something that said "step by step", I went there. It gave me an alphabet, which it pronounced for me. But then it didn't tell me where to go next. The next thing in line seemed to be grammar, so I clicked on that. I got a menu that had nouns, verbs, conjunctions, and absolutely everything about sentence structure... only it was layed out in alphabetical order! How are you supposed to know where you need to go first if it's in alphabetical order. There is simply nothing here that tells you how to learn. I have both French and Spanish programs by the Learning Company in their Learn To Speak series. These are excellent. So I know that a language program can be done more comprehensively. I can only hope that maybe someday they will make a Gaelic language program. So, if all the Transparent Language programs are like this one, I suggest you stay away.
Rating:
Summary: Not even close to 5 stars
Review: Using this product, you can hear the words being spoken by native Irish speakers, and it does have some good language games (if you could type fadas that is). Things wrong with product. 1) You can't type fadas -- this makes much of the program worthless. 2) If you are just starting out you need learn a basic vocabulary. There are no flashcards or anything to help you learn that basic vocabulary. 3) Like most languages there are different forms of words depending on if they are a plural, if it is past tense, etc. e.g. mouse and mice, or was and were, or slow and slowly. Irish is even harder because the beginning of words change not just the endings, and this product doesn't tell you why, how, or when those changes occur. This program is not great, but you can learn some Irish words and phrases, and it's the only thing out there.
Rating:
Summary: Very complicated!
Review: Very complicated.Not for beginners.Would benefit intermediate or advanced learners of the Irish Gaelic language.
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