The nature of summer courses is that they are fast-moving and dynamic events.  In our larger centres we may have as many as 400 students arriving in one weekend, all of whom need to be tested, interviewed, arranged into classes and inducted into the centre – as well as entertained!

Knowing how the first day works will help you to:

	know your role and where to be
	help the organisation run smoothly
	make our students welcome
	see the system not the chaos!

The aims of the first day

On day one of the course we aim to:

	make the students feel relaxed but also excited
	introduce them to the course centre and to the local town
	test their ability in English
	tell them about our expectations of them
	warm them up with a few activities.

Zigzag courses

Our courses involve the students having 3 lessons a day, followed or preceded by activities or excursions, and social events in the evening.  This is what we mean by the zigzag pattern – some students have classes in the morning and activities in the afternoon; some have morning activities and afternoon classes.

To make life simple (!) we attribute colours to groups so, for example, if a student is in the red group he or she will have classes in the morning and activities in the afternoon.  Someone in the blue group will do the opposite.  To keep it fair, we swap the groups around, usually every two weeks.  On large courses there may also be a yellow and green groups following the same pattern.

This system also applies to the first day of a course with some students being tested and placed in classes in the morning and having an induction programme in the afternoon while the others follow a reverse pattern – induction in the morning and tests and classes in the afternoon.

The timetable will look something like this.  The timetable on the right mirrors that on the left.

If you are teaching with Elac, you will be involved in the testing and warm-up lessons.  If you are an activity leader, you will be involved with the orientation part of the programme.  There's more about this on the pages dedicated to your roles.  We are coming to that.

Welcome Letters

Groups and individuals will be given welcome letters on arrival giving their programme for the following day. This will tell them which colour group they are in, and how the induction will be organised.