French Summer Course at St Flannan’s College, Ennis

French is the language of the whole course, not just the classroom. Students take class six mornings a week from 9:30 to 1:00, working through grammar, reading comprehension, written expression, aural preparation and oral exam practice on the Irish Junior Cycle and Leaving Certificate syllabus. Teachers are a mix of qualified Irish teachers of French and native French speakers trained in teaching French as a foreign language. Students are placed by ability after an assessment on arrival, and anyone who has completed one year of French at secondary school can attend. The school states the course gives over half an academic year of focused tuition, or forty hours of classroom learning.

The published fee covers the full course from the start date to the end date shown — a single block of seventeen to eighteen days, not a weekly rate. It includes accommodation, full board and tuition. Students buy their own grammar book and need pocket money for the tuck shop, laundry and swimming where the college has no pool of its own; all pocket money is lodged on arrival and spent through a card system rather than cash. Bus transport from Dublin to the college is offered by the school and is booked with the course.

Students board at St Flannan’s College for the whole course. Dormitories are split by gender and supervised at night by staff who sleep on the same corridor. Most dormitories sleep six to eight; some rooms take two or three. Students bring their own duvet, pillows and bed linen.

Full board at the college. Breakfast at 9:00, lunch at 1:00 and dinner at 5:45, with a tuck shop open in the afternoon.

Afternoons and evenings are given over to activities run in French by animators from French-speaking countries. The afternoon programme takes in tip rugby, GAA, football, basketball, racket sports, arts and crafts, music, Zumba, board games, yoga and swimming where the college has a pool. Evenings, after assembly, run to table quizzes, a film festival, treasure hunts, a céilí, casino night, an olympics, a song contest and a last-night disco — all conducted in French.

The course is held on the campus of St Flannan’s College, a day and boarding school in Ennis founded in 1846. The college cafeteria has recently been renovated into a Food Village. Sports facilities, classrooms and residential accommodation are all on the same campus.

Students live in French from the moment they register. The school’s language rule takes effect on arrival, which is why parents are asked to leave once they have brought their child to reception. Over three quarters of the students travel from Dublin, and the course is built around teenagers preparing for state examinations rather than around holiday tourism.