Name of organization: Ekonomsko-birotehnička škola Slavonski Brod 

E-mail: [email protected]

Good practice title: Distance learning encourages critical and creative thinking (about tourism) 

Baseline / problem: Students of the School of Economics and Office Technology (Hotel and Tourism Technician) in Slavonski Brod and their professor Ivana Opačak are slowly overcoming the challenges of distance learning and becoming aware of its benefits. During 4 hours of English language teaching, they successfully mastered new digital tools (Padlet, Genial.ly, Tricider) that will be useful in the process of communication and collaborative learning, but also the dissemination of results and evaluation of learning outcomes. As part of the 10th teaching unit "True Art", they processed the teaching unit "Tourism in Dubrovnik", which will be followed by the adoption of the skill of successful presentation and presentation of local attractions of the students' choice. 

Good practice: 
During the educational work, the students achieved the following learning outcomes: 
• the student uses the digital tool Padlet to present himself and his thoughts on distance learning in a virtual classroom environment; 
• the student analyzes a simple adapted and original text about Dubrovnik of medium length when listening and reading; 
• the student names the tourist sights of Dubrovnik (and, as an additional challenge, notices the good and bad effects of tourism in Dubrovnik); 
• the student uses the digital tool Tricider to share his / her expectations and adopted information about tourism in Dubrovnik with his / her classmates; 
• the student creates and, in the class Padlet, publishes digital (Genial.ly) material on which he presents 10 interesting facts about Dubrovnik; 
• The student, in the Padlet class, values his own work, as well as the work of one of his peers.

Before the beginning of distance teaching, the teacher created a class Padlet that will represent (always available to everyone) a treasury of tasks with instructions, work and creative materials. Clear rules have also been agreed - all teacher assignments will be dated and marked in yellow. All newly submitted student materials will be white, and the teacher will color the read / evaluated assignments in blue / pink. The first tasks for students (during the English language block class) were to master a new tool and present themselves and their thoughts on the new situation in the e-classroom - distance learning (students are invited to study online resources). The teacher was pleasantly surprised and encouraged by the positive experiences of the students and the willingness to work and study at a distance. Here’s what a classy Padlet looks like today: https://padlet.com/ivanaopacak/Bookmarks For the purpose of continuing the work (during the next block lesson of English), a Power Point presentation was made with clear instructions from the teacher. The same was shared by the teacher with the students in the Padlet and in the virtual Teams classroom (via a link to a document stored on Google Drive): https://drive.google.com/open?id=1F_1czmKwF8v__rxVFNSqbCCivYNFEJAP The presentation gave clear instructions to students on how to complete the task of listening and reading with comprehension, and a link to a digital discussion (Tricider) was attached in which students were invited to share their thoughts and observations during learning. Since there are about 10 students (members of the school debate club) in the classroom with an extremely high level of English language proficiency, two optional tasks have been added that refer to additional materials (original text of The Telegraph "Has Tourism Killed Dubrovnik" and hearing material of the same name). and a more active contribution to the Tricider debate. Here, the teacher's expectations were higher than the realization, but it is completely understandable if the students were not ready for additional challenges during the first week of distance learning. (This can always change in the future. The teacher will try to ignite a discussion about the good and bad effects of tourism in preparation for writing a discussion essay.) 

Problems and constraints encountered and solutions found: 
The last challenge / task for the students was to create digital material (according to the teacher's recommendation, Genial.ly presentation or interactive picture because the students already had the opportunity to create the same) to present 10 interesting things to see / do in Dubrovnik. The materials, after self-assessment according to the instructions of the teacher in the presentation, were distributed by the students in the class Padlet. This will be followed by peer evaluation and selection of the best work and (or) making a joint presentation about Dubrovnik. As an optional task, students will be instructed to create a presentation that brings 10 local landmarks to present their city / village to partners in a new eTwinning project. ETwinning challenges are a special joy in this classroom department! source: skole.hr 

Good Practice Category