FrenchGetting more from courses and groups
One limitation of the current install is that if you have say six year groups and each group has ten courses eg Maths (year2), French (year2) etc, that is 60 groups. With (say) 20 pupils in each year group there is a real need for some automation of the process so...
Download and install http://drupal.org/project/og_multiple_mandatory_groups_by_role .
Then go to /admin/user/roles and add the following roles (yours will vary):
Now go to /node/add/course and add something like
- Maths Y1
- Spanish Y1
- English Y1
- Maths Y2
- Spanish Y2
- English Y2 ... etc
You can now go to /admin/user/user/create and fill in a form for EACH pupil, in the [Roles:] section, remember to tick [Student] AND the year group they are part of.
PHEW! that is the hardest part but you only have to do it once and when the pupils move up at the end of the year you can simply move their UserRole to the next year. You now deserve a break for a well earned coffee!
Then go to /admin/og/og_multiple_mandatory_groups_by_role/groups [Available Groups] tab and add in all the Courses (and Groups) you wish to be automatically assigned to your Year roles. 
Now click the [Overview] tab and from the dropdown add all the Year roles
Now click on the [Assign Groups] tab and the Year you wish to work on > then tick the courses that relate to that year group - see below. Repeat this for each Year then press [Save Assignments] at the bottom
Thats it - all the setup is now done.
So if you are a teacher and you want to set Maths assignment/homework for Year One, go to create assignment in the usual way, give it a Title, Keywords, Due Date, Details, then in the [Groups] tick Maths Y1.
Hey Presto! all Year One pupils will now automatically received email details of the assignment. Also when they log on to the website (from School or home) it will be listed in their calendar and group details.