Get advice on all aspects of teaching in Wales in the TES Cymru Group. This is the place to go to discuss the Welsh curriculum, to talk to other teachers about pay and conditions and to chat about the issues facing education in Wales.
I can't speak, write or read Welsh...
Any advice on what to write on application form and how to respond when invited for interview ...
Can this be regarded as a weakness ...
Well, if they say it's "essential", then I assume, yes, it would be regarded as a weakness. :S
Why not try attending some lessons or a course in Welsh? I don't imagine you'd need a *particularly* high standard of Welsh to teach it as a second language to small children, so it would be a good idea to at least learn something. If you were attending an evening class or whatever, you could then write that on your application and mention it at interview. In that case, if you were the best candidate otherwise, they might still hire you with the hope you'd continue to learn welsh and could possibly help with those lessons in the future. It seems the most sensible thing to do. If Welsh is actually stated as "essential" then it's a considerable disadvantage if you can't speak a word of it.
Every teacher in our school is expected to be able to teach the children their welsh and to plan and deliver good quality helpwr heddiw daily language practise sessions, as well as using lots of incidental Welsh in their classroom commands and in their lessons.
When I first joined the school, there was a peripatetic teacher employed to deliver one of the children's lessons, but even then we still had to continue from their lesson and do the daily welsh too.
Now we are expected to be more and more bilingual, including Cymraeg in our displays etc. I would say that it would be very tricky (although not impossible) for a non-speaker to be able to do all of that easily.
Top of page