GH - Interested to hear about your early recruit training, though a little concerned. I assume that your recruits are not attested before their medical. In which case they shouldn't be doing any formal training that early on with the exception of their Recruit Selection Weekend. Until a recruit is fully attested and TOS he's only covered by the general MOD liability insurance provided for 'look at life' type events such as Ex Executitve Stretch and this places limitations on what you can do with them. Also, until their paperwork has been through APC and their basic sy check is done they should be considered visitors and escorted as such. I may have misunderstood the overall process you use, however, as it seems my lot do things differently
With regard to weapon handling - from an instructors point of view I fully understand your desire to see their reaction to handling a weapon as early as possible, and in my personal opinion basic skill at arms lessons early on are retention posative. However, and this is policy quoted from the lips of a very senior staff officer at a study day last year, "Thou shalt not teach subjects which are on the syllabus for the Part 2 CMSR(TA) 2 week basic training course run by ATRA at unit level during TAFS". They require a virtually blank canvas on which to start. Part of the reason put forward for this is to ensure consistency in training standards particulalry with respect to weapon handling. Apparantly there have been some horror stories of recruits turning up having been taught SLR drills on an SA80. Of course, the swell of opinion from the floor of that meeting was that if TA personel have qualified as SAA instructors then let them teach. The point was not conceeded.
Now rules is rules and my mob have been obeying them, but often my sprogs come back from their 2 week course having found it more intense than others because it seems many units are ignoring the rules and teaching them SAA on TAFS weekends. Since my guys are therefore at a disadvantage I'm forced to consider breaking the rules aswell. A few instructors at ATR have indeed been quoted as agreeing that we should introduce them to weapon handling before the 2-week-er, after all it does make it a very steep and intense learning curve for some of them otherwise.
Anyway, at the risk of a very long post, the outline of how we process our sprogs goes thus:
After one or two visits and the initial reception interview the completed forms are fed into the system, whilst the contact is nurtured by personal contact and mail shots. About once every six weeks we run a Recruit Reception Morning when the Doc does his medical bit, and we give each recruit a formal interview and a mock written entrance test. This is timed to feed into a Recruit Selection Course a couple of weeks later run at Regimental level. Until the RSC they are called potential recruits and treated still as visitors, though if they wish to attend drill night they are allowed to sit in on lessons for interest and generally 'buttered-up'. On the Sunday of the RSC they are formally attested in a ceremony with all the trimmings (less the Padre - good idea, I'll suggest that one to the boss).
Their first drill night as new recruits they receive a Troop Commander's address covering very very brief introductions to issues like H&S, Sy, PT advice, etc, with a big emphasis on drill night routine and values and standards. They then get the 'users' tour of the TAC to orientate them (having only had the 'visitors' tour before which excludes the armoury etc). Finally one of my JNCO instructors shows them how to clean boots & iron kit etc.
The remaining training night lessons before their 2-week-er, to answer D's original question, comprise mainly interest lessons which either reinforce the limited TAFS syllabus or are not on Phase 1 training at all. They are aimed PURELY at retention and nurturing interest, leaving the formal training to the weekends. For example, we'll get the NVGs and CWS out and let them have a go, introduce them to basic VP etc as signals doesn't clash with phase 1 trg. Also - Hand signals for guiding B-vehicles, mines awareness, Sqn & Regt history, foot drill, introduction to the bayonett and pistol (no drills), introduction to support weapons (again no drills just a lecture on parts & capabilities and 'feeling the weight'). vehicle camoflage drills, basic recognition, a briefing on how mobilisation works, introduction to survival skills, mini-command tasks etc etc. Also I get heads of sheds to get someone from their department to run an interest lesson on each career stream, 'Look at life - Chef' for example, where they find out what its like working in a particular job from the guy thats doing it now and have a go at some very simple bits. This helps them get an idea of what jobs are available to them and allows heads of departments with lots of vaccancies to 'sell' their department.
I must admit we've had to be very inventive to keep comming up with fresh ideas and keep them interested, but its a great way for the JNCOs to practice their teaching skills, because if they make the odd mistake the recruits won't take the piss and potentially damage their confidence as the trained soldiers might.
End of long scribble - hope this is useful