https://svitac.org

Staff: Gordana Varcaković, Dina Vošanović, Miloš Popić, Sanjin Vošanović

Local volunteers: Adin Midžić, Merima Hidanović, Ines Močević, Zorana Nemček, Mehmed Hidanović

‘Weltwearts’ volunteers: Lydia Luise Jung, Lana Fuchs

‘EVS/ESC’ volunteers: Hannah Luise Ursula Külper                

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ON-GOING PROGRAMME

• Culture and Art Diversity around the World – Includes Language, Art&Crafts, Music, Drama, and Sports workshops from Monday to Friday
  • Standard Language workshops – English and German
    • English – standard English language workshops for teenagers and young people
    • German – standard German language workshops for teenagers and young people
  • Conversational Language workshops – English, German
    • I love English – conversational English workshops for teenagers and young people
    • “Lasst uns Deutsch sprechen!“ (“Let’s speak German”) – conversational German workshops for teenagers and young people
  • Art&Crafts workshops – practical arts and crafts workshops for children and teenagers
  • Music workshops – samba, guitar, music workshops for children and young people
  • Sports workshops – for teenagers and young people
  • Drama workshops – for teenagers and young people
• Local languages lessons (Bosnian/Serbian/Croatian) for international volunteers

HIGHLIGHTS ON MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

• This month was very warm. The temperature was rising up to 19 degrees – so almost t-shirt weather. Therefore – the first time this year – we went outside with the kids which was really nice! As part of our regular activities, we focused on the hygiene and pyramid of healthy eating, where we emphasized the importance of maintaining hygiene and healthy eating methods by age-appropriate methods. International volunteers have also been doing a lot of different daily activities and they focused on different things (e.g. promotion of the organization through social media).
• About 138 participants regularly attended Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) activities in February. Participants were aged between 4 and 40 years old. The youngest and the oldest participants attended Culture and Art Diversity around the World workshops and English/German workshops for adults.
  • Younger group – They made the solar system, planets and various animal shapes from plasticine. They learned to write and pronounce letters I and J in local languages (Bosnian/Serbian/Croatian), maths and new words in English and German related to fruit, vegetables and tolerance. The group listened to the stories of “Dandelion Princess” and “Planets – Our Comrades” when they learned about the importance of friendship and the preservation of a healthy environment. In the Music Workshops, they continued to practice the song “Ivo’s train” and within that workshop practised maintaining the rhythm with previously made little rattles. They danced Zumba for children with the songs “Minions song Banana” and “I like to move it” from cartoon Madagascar. The group also had the opportunity to play together on various percussions and acoustic instruments. Highlight with the younger group was the workshop implemented for Mother Language Day when they learned how to say ‘love’ in Spanish, German, English, Turkish and Hungarian, and after the discussion adjusted to their age about different languages in the world, they dyed the worksheet.
  • Older group – They made masquerade masks and the greeting cards for Valentine’s Day. In the Language Workshops, the group learned new words related to spring, prepositions, peace and tolerance in English, German and Turkish. In the Music Workshops, the group has discussed topic „Role models in music and their impact on a young audience“, various music genres and analysed their lyrics with the goal of understanding the message of the text. The participants played a lot of volleyball, basketball and team spirit games. The highlight with the older group was a discussion that aimed to raise awareness of violence against women and girls when the participants had the opportunity to share experiences and highlight this burning problem in BiH and addressed the dangers and solutions in their opinion.

EVS/ESC, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

• In February, Svitac (Firefly Bosnia) very much appreciated collaborating with 3 international volunteers: two ‘Weltwärts’ volunteers from Germany and one EVS/ESC volunteer from Germany.
• Sending EVS/ESC and ‘Weltwärts’ – Two volunteers from Bosnia are doing their EVS/ESC and ‘Weltwärts’ service in Germany and Slovenia (9 and 12 months).

MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

• Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) representatives continued to attend regular monthly meetings with the youth centre coordinator and the other NGOs based in Brčko. The purpose of the last meeting was to share information about activities and plans for February and discuss activities scheduled to take place in the Youth Centre.
• Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) staff attended a workshop on ‘Preventing early school leaving’ held by the Youth Center Vermont in partnership with “Save the Children” and “Žene sa Une” as part of the project “Bright4AII – The Basic Right to Education for All children in Bosnia and Herzegovina”. The aim of the workshop was to animate local NGOs to recognize their role in addressing the problem of dropping out of school, and to empower and be more actively involved in preventing it.
• Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) representatives attended a workshop organized by the OSCE BiH entitled “Stereotypes, Prejudices and Discrimination” with a focus on the Law on Prohibition of Discrimination in BiH and practical examples.