[VioletaBlanca]

Hello,

I had an interview a little while ago and was offered the position of teaching a brand-new conversation class for a night school for adults (all sharing the same L1). I haven´t had communication with the interviewer since. All I know is that there will be a maximum of 12 students in this class, of various levels of proficiency. That was all the information that I was given. I do not know anything about their ages or occupations, nor their reasons for taking the conversation class. Now the fate of the class is in my hands in terms of designing a curriculum, activities, etc..

Because I have complete and utter autonomy for the course, the pressure is on, and it´s hard for me to plan for this class since I really don´t know anything about the student population that I will have. I know that the first class is the most critical, but also the most challenging, since I´m essentially working out of a vacuum.

I basically have 2 bottom line questions:

The first is how to go about making the most out of the first class (icebreakers, getting to know the students and their backgrounds) and any ideas for that first, crucial day.

The second question pertains to the best strategy to organize, structure, and effectively teach a weekly class of 90 minutes?

If anyone has any ideas for anything, or has had prior experience teaching under similar circumstances and has any advice, it would be greatly appreciated!