Svitac (Firefly Bosnia) Project Report – September 2020

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

Local volunteers: Adin Midžić, Merima Hidanović, Zorana Nemček, Almira Čehić, Šejla Huskanović, Lejla Imširović

‘Weltwearts’ volunteers: Leah-Ruth Bernhardt, Paul Funke

‘EVS/ESC’ volunteers: Dicle Girgin, Servet Bilmez                

 


 

ON-GOING PROGRAMME

  • Culture and Art Diversity around the World – Includes Language, Art&Crafts, Music, Drama, and Sports workshops from Monday to Friday
    • Standard and Conversational Language workshops – English, German
      • I love English – English workshops for children, teenagers and young people
      • “Lasstuns Deutsch sprechen!/Pričajmo njemački!“ (“Let’s speak German”) – German workshops for children, teenagers and young people
    • Art&Crafts workshops – practical arts and crafts workshops for children and teenagers
    • Music workshops – samba, guitar for children and young people

    HIGHLIGHTS ON MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

    • This month the school started again and brought a touch of normalcy to our small community. Our activities continued in a combination of interactive and online workshops. A month passed quickly and we had to say goodbye to our volunteers Dicle and Servet. International volunteers have been doing a lot of different daily activities and they focused on different things (e.g. supporting online activities, promotion of the organization through social media).
    • About 140 participants regularly attended Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) activities in September. 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 painted trees with hands, made colourful paper boats, plasticine and chestnut snails, and their favourite characters from cartoons. We read stories and fairy tales: Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Thumbelina, Wolf and Three Little Piglets and the song Hedgehog’s House by Branko Ćopić. They learned Cyrillic letters Ћ, Е, Ж, З (Ć, E, Ž, Z ) and the words that begin with these letters in local languages (Bosnian/Serbian/Croatian), maths and new words in English and German related to means of transportation, numbers, autumn and tolerance. In the Music Workshops, they learned and rehearsed the songs “Dolina mumija”, “Leteći medvjedi” i “Učimo brojati” (“Valley of the Mummies”, “Flying Bears” and “Learning to Count”). As part of our regular activities, we paid attention to hygiene, where we emphasized the importance of maintaining hygiene with age-appropriate methods. Highlight with the younger group was the workshop for International Democracy Day when they made a video and learned what democracy is.
      • Older group –  They made banners with motivational messages for peace and democracy in the world. In the Language Workshops, the group worked on using place and time prepositions in combination with cases, past tense verbs and sentence construction in English, German and Turkish. Besides, they practised daily communication and worked on projects and presentations for the school. The highlight with the older group was the workshop for International Peace Day when they took part in making a short video which was sending a message of peace.

    EVS/ESC, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

    • In September, Svitac (Firefly Bosnia) very much appreciated collaboration with 4 international volunteers: two ‘Weltwärts’ volunteers from Germany and two EVS/ESC volunteers from Turkey.
    • Sending EVS/ESC and ‘Weltwärts’ – One volunteer from Bosnia is doing his EVS/ESC service in Slovenia (9 months).

    MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

    • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) staff 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 discuss conditions and schedules for the continuation of centre activities.
    • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) staff participated in a radio show to promote social cohesion in Brcko. The aim was to promote social cohesion and the activities of the ‘Promote the Positive’ network. The show also intended to encourage greater involvement of other civil society organizations in this process.
    • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) staff participated in an Online Info Day “Meet the European Solidarity Corps” via the Zoom platform. The activity aimed to acquaint participants with the opportunities offered by the program, and how organizations from BiH can use them to provide opportunities for mobility to the target group with which they work and develop international cooperation. The event was organised by the SALTO Resource Centre (SALTO SEE RC) and the PRONI Centre for Youth Development as the Contact Point for the European Solidarity Corps (ESC) program for BiH.
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Activities