As our colleagues from Montenegro Vidosava Kašćelan and Ana Ivanović report, the living-democarcy.com website is indisputably very useful for all those involved in the teaching process. The materials can be used in all subjects, are cross-curricular, can be perfectly aligned with the existing curriculum and can be used in both formal and non-formal and informal education. The materials are useful for students, teachers, school administrators, parents and other participants and educators in education. One of the ways we have used in the Montenegrin education system is the use of multipliers in certain schools in the education system, who further disseminate the knowledge about the website and use its contents in the classroom. The multipliers are selected teachers in schools who have competences and are willing to continue working on the development of the democratic culture of the school and the democratic culture of society in general. With a certain number of multipliers, we conducted workshops to familiarise the participants with the website and to show them how to use the materials to work with pupils, colleagues, school management and parents.
The multipliers carried out several activities in schools, mainly in vocational schools and high schools. Most of these activities relate to work with pupils, but also with their colleagues and school management. The website was presented to teachers in schools, very often also to professional associations of teachers, mainly in the field of social studies, but also in other fields. Many presentations on the use of the website in schools were also attended by representatives of the school management.
Teachers are very satisfied with the materials offered on the website, they have found that they can be used for planning and preparing lessons, for expanding and supplementing existing topics in the regular curriculum that they implement with the students, and they have recognised their usefulness for the development of various skills of the students, especially critical thinking, media literacy, peaceful conflict resolution and the general development of skills for a democratic culture.
Concrete examples:
- The workshop on the legalisation of marijuana for medical purposes was conducted in the form of a debate. The students were divided into two groups that collected information “for” and “against” the thesis that was put forward. They used information from the website as well as from other sources. The students participated in a very lively discussion in which they presented facts for and against arguments, respecting the rules of debate, discussion and respect for different opinions. In this way they were able to build a culture of dialogue and critical thinking.
- The workshop on “Conflict Resolution and Student Mediation” aimed to develop a relationship of trust, respect, peaceful resolution of conflicts and respect for different world views. Student mediation allows for a more active role of students and their contribution to the resolution of various conflicts in school and beyond.
- The workshop on “Controversial Issues” enabled students to better identify various controversies in daily life. It is important to know how to live with controversies, so the students practiced different methods and techniques to resolve different controversial situations and learnt to understand and accept them.
- The workshop “Communication” was particularly useful. The students learnt about the importance of communication, different ways of communicating and practiced techniques of confident communication. They are aware that the quality of their lives depends on the way they communicate, that communication is a way of life, that it depends on the quality of our daily relationships with other people and with ourselves.
Thus, various workshops and activities have helped to promote the culture of democracy in the school and to guide different target groups, especially students, to use the website living.democracy.com as an important resource for teaching, daily work and life. We will continue to strongly support all those involved in their task of successfully influencing the development of a culture of democracy in their schools and pay them respect and high tribute for their work.
