School: Gort an Iubhair
- Location:
- Gort na nIúr, Co. Ros Comáin
- Teacher: Donncha Ó Fiachra
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0242, Page 114
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- Hedge Schools
28 4 38
About eighty years ago there were no schools as there are now. There were certain men and women who taught the children and adults. During the summer they taught along ditches and hedges and in the winter in houses and barns. It was mostly in the winter they taught as the people had no works to do and the filled in their spare time by going to school
The children used to start going to school at ten years of age and go until they were twenty-one and twenty-two years. The boys often went to school after coming home from England and they were good scholars also. There were special barns in which the people were taught in each district along the inside walls of the barn, there were planks for seats on which the scholars sat and on a kind of table in the centre of the barn sat the teacher. The pupils brought a few rods of turf each day to make a fire, and there were no chimneys in those days but a hole in the roof to let the smoke.
The principal subjects taught in the schools were called, - the three Rs: writing, reading, and arithmetic. There were a great many other subjects taught in the schools but these were the principle ones. A person had to be a very good scholar in reading and arithmetic before he was taught(continues on next page)
- Collector
- Patrick Egan
- Gender
- Male
- Address
- Gort na nIúr, Co. Ros Comáin
