eTwinning magic in Dubrovnik

I'm a perfectionist and I'm hardly ever totally satisfied with the workshops and seminars that I deliver. But last weekend at the eTwinning contact seminar in Dubrovnik I was completely totally fully satisfied and euphorically happy with my workshops A Little Bit of Magic with Collaboration Tools.

It was magical indeed! And I even had a magic wand and a magician hat filled with -I'm sure you would never guess! - with chocolate and gingerbread hearts, and what's more I also had my own (magician) assistant - Bart, with whom I also gave the opening plenary workshop called eTwinning on the Beach.

In my Magic Workshop I introduced some useful web 2.0 tools to the participants from 9 European countries, but the best part of the workshop had nothing to do with technology - it was all about collaboration: it was about singing karaoke and making a lip dub together!  The participants were so enthusiastic and passionate about it and I immensely enjoyed every second of the workshop.

Don't stop me now by the Queen was the song that I had chosen for karaoke and lip dub and it almost instantly became the "official" song of the whole seminar and so did the word "magic" - those three days in Dubrovnik were definitely all about magic.

The lip dubs are here:

eTwinning goes Dubrovnik

If you are a member of the Twinning community, you're provided with lots of opportunities for professional development, not only online but also in the real world. Workshops and contact seminars are organized in different countries all over Europe all year round and teachers can apply for those that are chosen by their national agencies.

Right now there are four workshops for Croatian teachers to choose from: in Stockholm, Billund, Brussels and Dubrovnik.The deadline for applying is August 28.

The contact seminar in Dubrovnik is organized by Dunja Babić, the NSS for eTwinning, and the staff at the Croatian  National Agency. Ten Croatian teachers will be selected to come to Dubrovnik and meet their colleagues from several European countries. Together they will learn about the Cross-curricular collaboration using Web 2.0 tools, make new contacts and start new eTwinning projects.

I'm especially looking forward to it because I'm one of the three invited speakers.

On the first day I'll be presenting along with Bart Verswijvel. Our presentation is named eTwinning on the Beach - quite appropriately so, considering the place where it will be held:

Oops sorry, not there, but quite close to it:

As you can see, it's almost on the beach. Bart and I have already done a joint presentation in Lisbon, which was very successful.

On the second day I'll be giving a workshop entitled "A little bit of magic with collaboration tools" and I promise you there'll be magic! And tools of course. But I won't forget the pedagogy behind the tools either.

Lidija Kralj, a Math and ICT teacher,  will also be giving talks. I'm  looking forward to her talk about Zondle which I would like to use with my students.

It really looks promising, doesn't it?  Contact your NSS and apply for the first contact seminar organized in Dubrovnik, one of the most beautiful cities in the world and the pearl of the Adriatic. Gosh, I really like this city!