BLOCKBUSTER MOVIE ‘BARBIE’ will be on the Leaving Certificate English syllabus for 2026.
The movie, which took €9,934,064 in box office receipts in Irish cinemas, was overlooked at last night’s Bafta awards in London last night.
However, in two years time, students in Ireland will be asked to compare various aspects of the film with other films – including its social context, the relationships between characters and the hero, heroine and villain.
The social media-fuelled fusion of Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s latest film Oppenheimer – known as Barbenheimer – saw many patrons attending both films on the same day during the opening weekend.
While Barbie will be getting a nod in the Leaving Cert, another new addition to the syllabus is Martin McDonagh’s film, The Banshees of Inisherin, which was filmed in Achill.
The Department of Education will today publish the list of the selected novels, films, poems and plays for the Leaving Cert exam in two years time.
They are chosen by a working group in the National Council for Curriculum
and Assessment, with the list of texts regularly being updated to keep them current.
The new novels added to the list include The Best We Could Do, the graphic novel by Thu Bui about one family’s journey from war-torn Vietnam and Lessons in Chemistry, a novel by Bonnie Garmus about a chemist who becomes a cooking show host.
The new plays added to the list include Dracula, Bram Stoker’s classic horror novel.
None of the texts are compulsory, so teachers and students will have a variety to
choose from.
The poetry list includes works from Nobel prize wining poet WB Yeats, Seamus Heaney, Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin and Paula Meehan. Many of the works on the list are already being studied for the 2025 Leaving Cert exams, including Sive by John B Keane and the Crucible by Arthur Miller.
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