These days a large number of students are attending the Icelandic Courses at the University Centre of the Westfjors. These courses have been held since 2008 and so this is the eighth year that such courses are on offer. This year there are eight courses on offer, ranging from beginners courses to advanced courses. The number of students is around 80 and the teaching takes place in Ísafjörður, Suðureyri and Núpur in Dýrafjörður.

The organization of the courses has mostly been the same since 2008 as it has given good results. During the mornings students attend classroom studies where the basics of grammar and vocabulary are taught through lectures and exercises. In the afternoons the teaching is more like in university where students can choose from elective courses with different approaches to the language learning. The topics offered in the elective courses are divers, for example choir, metrics, first aid, shopping rally and even how to swear in Icelandic. Students are of course free to do other things than attend the electives such a shopping, swimming, sitting at a café or hiking. Students have been hard at work using the language skills that they have acquired during their stay in these real life circumstances and people working at shops and cafes in Ísafjörður have been very good in replying only in Icelandic. Such outside help is invaluable for our students especially since the main goal of the courses is to help students to use the language in real life situations.

On Friday August 14 teaching on the Intermediate course came to an end. The final ceremony for the course was held at the Ísafjörður Museum. Yesterday, Monday August 17 we welcomed new coming students that will attend a one week Crash Course and a one week Advanced Special Course. All the courses will end on Friday August 21 and after that it is up to the students how they keep up with the language, whether it will be in Ísafjöður, Akureyri, Reykjavík or even in their home country.