Svitac (Firefly in Bosnia) Project Report – March 2025

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

Local volunteers: Eldar Bešić, Amna Balija, Aida Slomić, Fatima Bukvić

‘Weltwärts’ volunteers: Ada Gabriela Groneick, Paula Scholz

‘ESC’ volunteers: Pia Sophie Jonas

      

ON-GOING PROGRAMME

  • Culture and Art Diversity around the World – Includes Language, Art&Crafts, Music, Drama, and Sports workshops from Monday to Friday (4-14)
    • Standard and Conversational Language workshops – English, German
      • I love English – English workshops for 15-30
      • “Lasstuns Deutsch sprechen!/Pričajmo njemački!“ (Let’s speak German) – German workshops for 15-30
    • Music workshops – samba, guitar for 15-30

    HIGHLIGHTS ON THE MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

    • This month was full of great activities, interesting topics, and cheerful, smiling faces of our participants. We drew, coloured, played together, and socialized with quizzes, presentations, and puzzles. Creativity, innovation, and learning go hand in hand! Whether you’re a curious kid or a teen with big dreams, there’s always room to explore new ideas, think outside the box, and share what you discover with others. In addition to regular daily activities, we organized several events with 9th-grade and high school students, worked on new ideas for future projects, and updated the working agenda. 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 143 participants regularly attended Svitac’s (Firefly in Bosnia’s) activities in March. Participants were aged between 4 and 30 years old. The youngest and the oldest participants attended Culture and Art Diversity around the World workshops and English/German conversational workshops.
      • Younger group – They talked about rainfall, space, dinosaurs, the sun and solar energy, flowers and plants, and sometimes a game of chess was played. The youngest participants enjoyed the creative part and modelling fun items (e.g. small dinosaurs, the sun, pots with flowers, umbrellas, mini planets, raincoats, aliens, and doves). The group continued with practicing rhythms, rehearsing songs, and dance choreographies. The participants continued learning the Cyrillic alphabet and practising writing the letters Г and Д (G, D). They did warm-up exercises and yoga for children, and every Thursday they danced, did sports and practiced reading and listening to stories (Pippi Longstocking, Story about an elephant and a mouse). In the English, German, and Turkish language workshops they learned words related to airplanes, weather, mammals, horses, camping, and birthday celebrations. All workshops are implemented with an educational visual method with pictures and video; informal educational workshops aim to develop creativity, memory, motor skills, empathy, socialization, and tolerance for diversities. The highlight with the younger group was the workshop for the International Day of Happiness, during which they talked about the importance of happiness in their lives.
      • Older group –  They discussed the following topics: cultural prejudice, everyday racism, disability discrimination, ageism, fair trade, and things that make us happy. In this way, we want to provide young people with a safe and neutral space, where they can express their opinions and express positive and negative emotions, without fear of condemnation. In the Language Workshops, the group worked on practising everyday communication, reading and translating short texts, phrases, grammar, school homework, and interesting projects. The highlight with the older group was the interactive workshop for the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination when they discussed racism and discrimination, shared their personal experiences, and emphasized that most racist incidents aren’t always direct insults, threats, or physical attacks.

ESC, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

  • In March, Svitac (Firefly in Bosnia) very much appreciated the collaboration with 3 international volunteers from Germany.
  • Sending ESC and ‘Weltwärts’ – Two volunteers from Bosnia are doing their service in Germany (12 months).

MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

  • Svitac’s (Firefly in 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 meetings was to discuss conditions and schedules for the continuation of centre activities.
Categories:

Activities, news, Project Report