ACTIVITIES

16.5.2022. 5th grade students Melanie, Vanessa, Mia and Kim are actively participating in the extracurricular activity Erasmus + and as part of the project "Opening the door to outdoor" travel to Iceland and Crete. As these are quite distant destinations, the students will travel by plane.

As we think and act ecologically in our school, the students explored ways to travel “green” to their destinations. Of course, it is possible - there are trains, buses, ships and ferries. The students successfully explored all the possibilities and reached their destination via the Internet. However, the trip would take a long time and there would be no possibility to get to the destinations on time.

So they will still be flying to Iceland and Crete, but that doesn’t mean we won’t be using the “green travel” opportunities on one of the next mobilities.

9.3.2022. Through the teaching of Nature and Society, third grade students learned how to orient themselves in nature. They were learning about sides of the world, scales, types of maps, compass, etc. But in order not to leave everything just learning from books, they used the beautiful winter day to walk around our city. They visited the Tourist Board of the City of Rovinj, which gave them maps of the city, and with the help of the city plan and compass, they explored the place where they live. They learned first hand how to mark churches, rivers, roads, roads and how to navigate with a compass. Experiential hands-on-doing approach which the pupils really enjoyed and expressed the wish that there would be more such days during the school year.

15.01.2022. After the winter holidays, a white envelop with letters from Iceland waited for pupils in the Croatian school. They were so excited about opening them and they immediately started to read what their penpals wrote to them. We are still waiting for letters from other partner countries and a new mascot to come to our school in order to show it our beautiful town, tradition and culture. Pupils from Croatian Erasmus+ group are looking forward to meet their friend live in Iceland in May. 

15.12.2021. While some schools are closed again because of covid, we are doing our best to proceed with project activities with playing online kahoots and writing letters to our penpals. Our mascots are continuously traveling and we take pictures of their lives in that other country.

The Dutch school had two visits until now and the third mascot from Ireland is on a Christmas break in the Netherlands. The mascot from Greece is on his way to Germany. Where the Miffy is we do not know at the time of writing, but we are sure that all the mascots are having great time abroad.

The idea is that all the mascots will visit each country, so that they can show a little of what they are experiencing in the various countries with the help of photographs. It is surprising that even the older children find it fantastic to have a cuddly toy as a guest.

10.12.2021. It is quite cold now in Greece and this is maybe the reason why puffin from the Northern Ireland arrived at the south of Europe :-) 

Of course this is not the reason why the bird from Iceland made such a distance - it is our traveling mascot that Greek students are going to host during Christmas holidays and show all the beauties Crete has. We are sure that somebody is going to show the puffin the Knosos Palace, nice beaches and much more before we meet all together in Greece on our mobility week.

8.12.2021. So... todays all of our letters are starting on their way to partners schools. Pupils from Álftanesskóli wrote their letters for their penpals and now are looking forward to getting one from Croatia, Germany, The Netherlands, Northern Ireland and Crete. Together with letters there is Miffy to who is flying to the Northern Ireland to see how the pupils are living there and to have a physical mobility :-)

28.11.2021. What a wonderful day in Croatian school! We started to pair our penpals and kids were so excited when expecting where from their pair will be. Finally they were quite happy since they are going to meet new friends from Germany, Iceland and Greece. In order to write their introducing letter as detailed as possible, we made for them some tips so we are waiting for letters to be returned to school and tthen sent to partner schools.

20.11.2021. A new mascot has arrived in Croatian school from Greece and her name is Lizzie. It is one of the Paddy Pal family member and as soon as Lizzie came in the Croatian school, pupils had the task  to find out what kind of mascot the Northern Ireland friends sent us and then they had two weeks to show Lizzie the town, surroundings, school life etc.

16.11.2021. After a hard work of discovering partner countries, Icelandic pupils manage to make posters about those they are going to cooperate with. A posters of Germany, Northern Ireland, Croatia, The Netherlands and Greece were made, presented to each other and now they are put in the Erasmus+ wall to witness the Erasmus cooperation between European schools.

18.10.2021. The first quiz for Croatian and German quiz played today! Pupils were very motivated to participate and getting to know their friends. German pupils had the possibility to learn that Croats invented electricity, a tie, first rice chocolate, the capital city and the flag while Croatian pupils learnt about traditional food, composers, fact about Germany etc. Nice activity and motivated pupils.

22.10.2021. What a long flying from Iceland! The Holy Mary school from Derry had the opportunity to host the Icelandic mascot puffin for two weeks in order to show him the school, introduce him the school activities, curriculum and how the little students are spending their afternoons. They enjoyed to have it in their homes, and all the adventures will be possible to read once the puffin returns to his home in Iceland.

21.10.2021. The weather is still nice in Germany so the teachers from Fanny Hensel Schule from Leipzig decided to take pupils outdoor in order to have lessons outside their classrooms. Math, Phisical education and storytime was set for this sunny day. Kids loved the outdoor lessons and they are so happy when teachers deli

16.10.2021. An unusual day was organized in Croatian school celebrating Erasmus days. An eTwinning event called European breakfast was organized and we tried to give our pupils and teachers the opportunity to taste typical products that partner countries Croatian school is collaborating with are having for breakfast. There was Italian nutella and briosche, French cheese, Icelandic cakes and skyr, greek yogurt, the Dutch stroopwafels, Deutsch sausages and of course - typical Istrian breakfast! A day to remember, full of taste despite of measures we had to be respect.

15.10.2021. Erasmus dys were celebrated in Derry school too. Pupils were learning about partner countries, made activities in order to get to know better cultural similarities and differences between them and they danced traditional music dances too. The school is preparing pupils and teachers for the first teacher training session which will be held in November in Northern Ireland and we are all looking forward to seeing each other face to face for the first time.

14.10.2021. Three teachers from the Dutch school followed a training on the usefulness of outdoor lessons. Besides the theory that is known about this, teachers were also given examples and they were allowed to experience the fun of it ourselves.

They learned even more the importance of outdoor classes and got tips and ideas which they will share among their colleagues in the school during the year.

When all partner countries will be allowed to physically participate in meetings and team moments again, Dutch teachers will discuss with the other teachers what they have learned and disseminate ideas in order to motivate them to use this methods in their school.

After the Christmas break, a consultation with the outdoor BSO is also planned. Sandra Hofhuis has contacted Dutch school and would like to share her experiences and knowledge with teachers. The photos show that teachers also enjoy outdoor lessons.

14.10.2021. In order to celebrate Erasmus days, Icelandic pupils had to make posters and find information about European countries they are cooperate with. Their teacher Anna set them the task and information they had to find about each country and they were retreiving the internet searching for cultural, historical, natural and geographical fact about Croatia, The Netherlands, Germany, Greece and Northern Ireland. 

Not an easy work, but a great exercise to get to know better EU countries.

14.10.2021. Every year Erasmus days are celebrated as the unique opportunity to organize an event, share our Erasmus experience or spread the word about our project. This year Erasmus days were held from October 14 to 16  and each school found a way to disseminate information about project that we are working on. 

German pupils made a small exhibition about all partner countries and learnt about flags, drew Miffy, made windmills and volcanoes, learnt the most important fact about each of them and talked with their peers about project activities they are going to realize throughout this project. Look at the list of all activities carried out in the Fanny Hensel Schule from Leipzig about what they have make in order to know Croatia better and a presentation about Iceland pupils made. Excellent job!

7.10.2021. Playing Kahoot quizzes between partner schools is one of the activity set by our Erasmus plan. This is the way how pupils will learn about countries they are going to visit through play, but besides just playing, this is a great preparatory activity and getting to know better European countries.

In the beggining of October Greek and Icelandic schools were playing quiz and were able to discover lots of cultural, historical and natural beauties and facts of each other countries.

29.9.2021. During the time when we were not able to cooperate because of school closures, we decided to collaborate online in a way that each country make their own Kahoot about their own country and culture. All the pupils from all partner countries will have the opportunity to play with each others and this will serve as a kind of preparation for visiting other countries. 

Last week of September the Dutch pupils learned about Northern Ireland and viceversa. It was amasing to see how kids enjoyed playing quiz, but more than that it was surprising to see how many they have learnt from that experience. We are looking forward to meet other countries virtually in that way before we start to travel and meet each other personally

14.05.2021. As we allready mentioned, we used the mammouth as a template to start to discover about Crete. The school librarian prepared the working sheets and the task was to search online and traditional encyclopedia to find out about history and Greek culture. Pupils were very motivated to learn in that way and they liked more the online retrieving then the classical one. Here are the sheets we made for them.

7.05.2021. Croatian pupils got the mammoth from Crete, but had no idea how mammoth is connected to the biggest Greek island. This is why the teachers gave them the task to find out why Greek school send the mascot of mammoth and then we had a project work on how to searh information in encyclopedia. We found  lots of information about the island we are going to visit and now we gathered information about greek salad, bouzouki, Knossos palace etc. We are looking forward to getting to know better the island when we will travel there.

21.04.2021. Our project has several goals, unfortunately some of these goals are being held back by Corona. When we started our project we were immediately confronted with a school closure. While one school in Europe was still going on, other schools were closed. This made it much more difficult for the students from the other European schools to make contact and get to know each other's culture.

Every time we hoped to meet each other, the Corona measures put a stop to this.

In the periods that pupils can go to school, teachers can continue with the main goal: outdoor classes. Our goal is to give at least one outdoor lesson per week. The easiest to realize are the math lessons. Groups 3, 4, 5 and 7 from Dutch school started with  lessons outside once a week and they really enjoyed it.

7.04.2021. Hlapić, a famous Croatian mascot from the children's novel started its journey towards Europe. Pupils from the 4th grade after having read the novel wrote a short letter and  sent it to the Dutch friends. Hlapić is known as a real hedonist and adventure mouse, so we are sure that he will enjoy staying at your school. Take care of him, show him your school, town, your tradition, culture atc in order he could prepare our pupils for a visit to your country.

8.2.2021. Penpals activity is one of the project activity we started to work on. The idea is to connect pupils from different partner countries in order to find penpals and get to know better how their peers are living in the other EU countries, what kind of music they like, what is their favourite book, how do they spend afternoons etc. For the introduction letter, we made a All about me sheet and distributed it to pupils who would like to take part in activity and were surprised to see how many of them are willing to meet their friends. Lets see how we are going to pair them :-)

8.2.2021. Since we can't travel due to the pandemic situation, we decided to let our pupils travel virtually. We set up the Travelling mascot activity in order that each school send to partner school one mascot representing their own country. Then the mascot will stay in each partner school for two weeks, pupils will take it home, show the beauties of their region and send it to other country. In that way we will have virtual traveling information and tips of our partner countries as an introduction of a real traveling experience. The first mascot Lundi is already on her first trip to Northern Ireland! Looking forward to receiving our owns!

15.12.2020. After the online meeting about Christmas tradition in each partner countries, Greek school sent us a song with best wishes for holidays.

8.12.2020. During the first days in December we were very busy by preparing Christmas cards for our friends and searching for information about how Christmas was celebrated in Croatia decades ago. So, after all the work we have done, we are very happy because we could have present you our tradition and sang you a song, but more of that, we too learnt something new too :-) Hope our Christmas cards will arrive soon to your schools. We wish you happy and healthy holidays!