This morning we learned more about the institutions where Laura, Carlos and Fernanda work: Funiber.org with headquarters in Barcelona, the Volkshochschule in Salzburg, and Brighton & Hove City College, Cactus Language Centre and EF summer schools in Brighton.
These creative presentations were perhaps especially appreciated by the lucky two who won a Mozartkugel each in the 'Who wants to be a millionaire'-contest run by Carlos.
Show and tell - moderation techniques and learner authonomy (Vera and Alexandra)
After our coffee break, Alexandra gave a very inspiring introduction to Moderation Techniques, with a lot of useful information. We all got to try out the different techniques as participants, and then we were asked to 'put our teacher's head on' in order to reflect on the methods in question.
These moderation techniques were completely new to some of us, others have made use of them for several years. There were lively discussions, useful exchanges of ideas and experiences - and lots of laughter.
As an interesting side-effect of this exercise, we got a fairly good idea of what we (participants) think of the TeachingCulture! course so far. We also got a glimpse of what we expect of Module 3 which we will be working on after Vilnius.
We could also draw the conclusion that our stay in Vilnius
- not least yesterday's folkdance practice and performance
- has created a good group feeling and an open and a positive atmosphere!
Aranchas Report about Simones session – wednesday afternoon
We started with Simone´s session this afternoon, not so sunny as the others were, but smelling of springtime just as the others were, but smelling of springtime just as the others. Lithuania smells really great, it smells of lilac, and lime trees, and cut grass.
We spoke about stereotypes, and then we had to think about what the people from our country feel and think about the other participants´nationalities...the words that we used weren´t very attractive, so we asked ourselves how these words had come into our mind!!! It may be that the massmedia, ancient beliefs, historical or political reasons make us create these images.
In any case, it was clear that our goal must to be to try to put an end to them.
After tea-coffee we were all ready for the Trakai excursion; Trakai is the ancient capital of Lithuania
(s. XIV) and is 27 km away from Vilnius, it is very famous, thanks to its palace and three lakes and there is typical and traditional architecture with three windows in its facade.
The lake has an magnificent view with a lone swan that we suspect is monitored by an electric machine under water. The castle was built in the XIV century by Duke Ketutis, but it was destroyed several times by wars and crusaders. Now it has been almost completely reconstructed and that gives it a “Hollywood” theatrical look.
We were fascinated by the landscape and we walked around the castle. After a short shopping break (amber, of course, and other traditional objects from Trakai and other parts Lithuania) we returned to Vilnius and we arrived at lovey Belmont, an ancient French coffee house with splendid surroundings (including waterfalls), where we had a delicious dinner outside, listening to Eros Ramazzotti!
Could you possibly ask for more?
