Report: Beginners Russian course at the International College Introduction This report looks at my experience of the Beginners Russian course at the International College. The course contains many elements that give novices a good start with this language. At the end a few recommendations are listed to make this course even more valuable for its participants. Course content This six month course covers all the required basics to get started with Russian. The aim of the course is to allow attendees to read in Russian and to hold small conversations in the A1/A2 level. There is a good balance between class lecturing and home assignments. The grammar is not too intensive which can be seen positive or negative at the the same time. This leads to a lot of by heart learning. Teacher and tutoring The lecturer Pavel, who recently moved to London, is a native from Yekaterinburg and never missed the opportunity to enhance the lectures with interesting anecdotes from Soviet and current times. The tutors were not fully ideal for the course as they were not from Russia. They conveyed the sense that Russian is used in many different countries but their inputs would have been more useful for an advanced course. Recommendation The course could have taught more grammar as this would allow students to explore the language on their own. The biggest area of improvement is the choice better suited tutors, that focus more on the language needs of beginners than to overwhelm with too many cultural details from different Russian speaking countries.