Give the trainees the following example:

You are going to go to France for a three- month work exchange program. Many of the professionals you will meet while you are there will know English and you will be able to converse with them. However, you will be staying with a French family (that does not speak English) and hope to do some traveling to different places on the weekend. You have a tutor that can spend 20 hours with you before you leave.

• Ask the group, "What are the most important things you will need to learn in order to function at the level you want?" (What will you need to say, read or write?)
• As a group, brainstorm ideas in response to the question.
• Ask one or two trainees what items from the list they can already do. (This would be their skills assessment.)
• Highlight the skills or knowledge the trainees lack. This would be the components of their course in a learner-centred program.

• Introduce the informal interview as a way of accomplishing the needs and skills assessment.
• Referring to the tutor training manual, highlight the sample surveys used and discuss the rationale for using some of them.

For example:

A: Education / Background

• Where did you grow up?
• Did you go to school there? How many years did you go to school?
  Note the discussion in the tutor training manual regarding how the level of education can influence what you teach. Further information regarding how education can affect the teaching of grammar is highlighted in Session 6.
• What are schools like in your country?
  This will give the trainee a good idea of how the tutoring sessions should be handled. If learners are used to a system where they are given a lot of homework, you may want to do the same. If they are used to assignments being paper-based, keep this in mind as well.
• What is your first language?
  The first language can affect where you need to start with a beginning learner.
• Do you speak any other languages?