Shetland dialect at Learning Festival

Dialect teaching resources from Shetland will be displayed during Scotland’s Festival of Learning at the SECC in Glasgow this week. (24th-25th September)

Da Ditty Box and Da Gaer Box are the products of a unique partnership between the Shetland Islands Council’s Schools Service and the dialect promotion group, Shetland ForWirds. A dialect assistant, Frances Tait, was appointed to a graduate placement by the SIC two years ago, following an approach by SFW seeking support for dialect in local schools .

The SIC had produced dialect packs ten years earlier with an undertaking to update them. This formed the basis of the project. When Frances Tait started work, she and SFW began updating existing materials as well as developing new materials for use in local nursery schools and playgroups. SFW convenor, Laureen Johnson and two other committee members Christian Tait and Iris Sandison worked alongside Frances and in close co-operation with enthusiastic pre-school staff who were keen to get involved. Last September, the new pre-school dialect resource pack - Da Ditty Box - was launched. An evaluation now shows that it has been welcomed and is being used regularly. Much appreciated by busy staff are the detailed Activity Sheets, which show how the bright new materials fit into topic areas, and how they can be used to fulfil the requirements of the modern curriculum. Teachers can ‘tick a lot of boxes’ using one of these dialect resources. This approach was a direct result of surveys carried out among staff. The team realised that, if the material was to be well used, it must be useful to teachers, and fit into their programmes.

The team then moved on to develop materials for the early Primary school years using the same formula – a mix of stories, poems and songs, adapted, re-vamped or created by the SIC/SFW team, teachers and writers, all recorded on CD, and again, all matched to early primary topics and backed up by detailed suggestions for use. A launch party for Da Gaer Box took place as part of Shetland’s annual book festival, Wordplay, earlier this month. A number of talented local artists donated illustrations and their work is on show at Islesburgh Community Centre until the end of the month. Da Gaer Box will now be distributed to all Shetland’s primary schools.

When HMI carried out its inspection of the SIC’s Schools Service this year, Da Ditty Box was highlighted as an example of “good practice”. This led directly to the opportunity to display it (and now Da Gaer Box too) at the Learning Festival. Frances Tait will be in Glasgow with SIC colleague, Frances Browne.

Report from Mary Blance