Learning a language means learning to speak it. What role does this play in TLC classes?

Learning to speak is definitely the priority in all TLC's Standard and Intensive Classes. Our small group sizes - Micro (3 - 4), Mini (4 – 6) or Opti (5 – 8)-  set the optimal preconditions for each student having lots of opportunity to practise speaking. Our slogan is At TLC you have more to say – and we mean it! By the way, at TLC we also offer Conversation Courses in most languages. You can find more information about these under Focus Courses.

What about teachers' qualifications. Are these important?

Yes, this is critical to teaching quality but is often hard to check.. Some schools have the teachers listed on their website with their qualifications. Another help is to see if the school has been quality certified – this guarantees that some checking has taken place. (Quality labels include eduQua and the very stringent EAQUALS plus certification of individual language departments done by Instituto Cervantes and Goethe Institute.)

At TLC all teachers teach their mother-tongue; 90% have a university degree and 100% have a diploma or certificate as a qualified teacher (SVEB, CELTA, DELTA, TEB etc.) We invest 2% of our turnover in continued professional development and training.

How meaningful are quality labels or certificates?

They show that the school strives for quality. But here too, not all labels are created equal e.g. not all certification processes involve observing classes.
TLC is regularly inspected by and has current accredition from:

• eduQua – the Swiss quality label for schools
• EAQUALS – the European labels for language schools
• Instituto Cervantes (Spanish)
• Goethe Institute . (Our German department is in the process of obtaining this.)

Based on our experience, EAQUALS says most about the quality of the teaching. The inspectors spend up to three days observing classes, speaking to students and teachers as well as checking personnel contracts, insurances and marketing information for fairness and transparency.

How often do new classes start?

We run on a trimester system (Jan - April/ April - August/ Sept. - Dec.) so new classes start then. As we always plan a number of parallel classes at optional times, these start as soon as we have enough students. “Enough” usually means 1 student less than our minimum - to make this possible we reduce the class time. We try to make sure people do not wait more than a month at most. We strive to find a solution either by offering private or semi-private lessons or  by running the class as a microgroup.

I have had bad experience with Beginners classes in which the other students were most definitely not beginners.  What does TLC do to make sure this doesn’t happen?

We always ask students if they have any previous knowledge of the language. If they say yes, they have to do an entrance test. Sometimes the results of this are insufficient to put them higher than Beginners. In other cases the students have not used the language for decades and really want to start from the beginning. Based on the test result and on their speaking, we decide where best to place them.
Experience has shown that within a month or two the differences in starting level even out. In fact, often the “Zero-Beginners” make faster progress than the “False Beginners.”