Nadia and I attended the play, “The Blue Dragon” last week. It is one of the features in the BITEF (Belgrade International Theater Festival). The Festival is as old as I am in its 43rd year. This is quite amazing considering the political tumult Belgrade and Serbia has been through since the festival started.
We thought The Blue Dragon was brilliant. The play was done by Robert LaPage, who is a Canadian playwright and director. We were enthralled with the sets and lighting. It was amazing the scene changes and how real everything looked and felt. They went from a snowy day outside to an airport terminal, inside of an apartment, to biking in the city, throughout the play. The scene above shows La Page demonstrating Chinese symbols and their meaning.
The play was set in modern China and looked at Chinese culture and society, the effects of time on love, among other themes. It made me want to visit China to see it for myself. We were also impressed with the Yugolsav Drama Theater (below).
Budapest, Hungary is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Above is just one tiny example of the amount of architectural beauty that abounds. Everywhere one looks, down hundreds of streets, towers, facades, statues, etc. can be appreciated. And all of the buildings are massive. It felt a bit like Washington DC in the fact that there are so many areas with landmark buildings and squares. I can see why most of the city is an UNESCO World Heritage site. I can’t believe all of the buildings survived WWII and the communist era.
The international school is also spectacular. It is set about 7 miles out of the city amidst orchards and villages. The K-12 campus is huge and it looks like a university campus. If I was working at the school, it would be nice to live in the village near the school.
Now the bad side – The over 3 million inhabitants of the Budapest metro area and more than 20 million tourists make the city feel crowded. Every where we went, from the cinema, to the grocery store, to the zoo, was packed with people. We felt it and it must increase the stress level of everyone. It will be something to consider when we make our next move to another international school. Many international schools are located in large cities and this will be a consideration. Belgrade is a nicer size. We also saw many more homeless people in the streets. I am not sure where they are in Belgrade, but you just don’t see them. Only the occasional gypsy, but they usually have a home. We also noticed that the street people were drinking publicly, bottles full of a yellow alcohol.
Our first hotel choice was hilarious. Nadia picked it over the internet and it looked like a nice family apartment. When we got there, it was in the middle of the red light district. They did not accept credit cards – only cash and I had to go to an ATM. While walking to the ATM, a prostitute said hello to me. Nice, with the family in the car 10 meters away. We called the owner and got out of our obligation and found a nice suite hotel in a better part of the city.
The Hungarians were much nicer this time than when we went in Christmas of last year. They make a big point of helping tourists and I had locals explain the IKEA parking lot ticket machines, people apologize for rude salespeople, etc. I imagine tourism brings a lot of money to the city. We saw tour buses and groups everywhere!
The country is much more developed than Serbia. The standard of living and cost of living are both much higher. This is good and bad, especially for expats living in the country. In talking with the international school’s principal, childcare and domestic help would be too expensive there.
The Hungarians look central European and Slavic, but their language and ethnic background is distinct from their neighbors. The language is very complex, with most words having over 10 letters and lots of symbols above the vowels. it is related to Finnish, but distantly related and the Finns don’t understand it. There are around 10 million Hungarians and the country is one of the biggest tourist destinations in the world. With the architecture, wine industry, thermal baths, history, I can see why.
This was our second trip to the city. Our first I blogged here. There is still more to explore and we will definitely return.
This weekend we headed 4 hours north to the capital of Hungary, Budapest. Our boys’ soccer teams were playing the American International School of Budapest. I brought the family up to watch the game and enjoy the weekend in a beautiful city. The kids are shown above playing in the hotel room.
That is the funny thing about kids, they enjoy different things than adults. Nadia and I were appreciating the amazing architecture of the buildings of Budapest. Most of the city is an UNESCO World Heritage site and I can see why. Everywhere one looks, there are huge, ornate facades on these magnificent buildings.
The kids enjoyed most the hotel rooms and the swing at the zoo.
We celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary Wednesday, September 17th. Nadia and I are shown above with Ocean and Oliver in our yard before our big night out. We were married in Coral Gables, Florida in 1999. We had a civil service and had a small reception at Tia Silvia’s home. Our more important anniversary is Halloween, the day in 1997 we first fell in love.
To recognize the occasion, we went to dinner at Cantina de Frida. This is the “hot” place to go in Belgrade for the slightly older, hip crowd. The restaurant is named after Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. It is located on the Sava River in an old warehouse. Some of the buildings have been converted to restaurants, shops, and bars. It had great food and a very nice atmosphere. We then went to the Yugoslav National Theater and caught a performance in the BITEF. More on that later.
John went through his International School of Prague Moodle pages. It started there as a grassroots movement with a small group of teachers. They are in Year 5 of implementation and obviously far ahead from us. He said we are in good shape and can avoid the mistakes his school made in implementation. Things I learned:
All faculty at his school need to do the skills below (Moodlic Literate)
log in to Moodle
upload a file
participate in a forum
participate in a wiki
A Minimal Requirement for teachers on their pages is to post all homework assignments, and have resources (worksheets – word docs – web links.)
No requirements for teachers to post their grades. They are moving to a Admin Software that will do this for them.
ESL kids love forums on Moodle and they can write at their own pace and they don’t stand out in a classroom environment. Want the forums to be a safe environment.
New teachers when they are hired, they go through an orientation on Moodle. They get all the orientation information, and participate in forums. It would be a good mentoring method.
Administration team, committees, PTA, Board of Trustees put all of their minutes, etc. on Moodle.
All that is produced at the school through Moodlic, it is the property of the school and it gets archived. The teacher can take the course with them, although it is not compatible with Blackboard.
At ISP, Moodlic is only for teachers and students, not parents. Students can share password with the parent. The idea is that parents can’t walk into a classroom.
ISP has turned off the chat and the messenging, because too much of temptation for students.
Recommend everyone to 320 gig portable hard drive to back up their work. All students have a USB flash drive to take with them.
Teachers responsible for backing up their moodle pages.
Google docs can be integrated into Moodle. ISP is gmail. No email accounts for students.
Faculty Meetings minutes, etc. on Moodle Course. The forum occurs before the meeting.
Faculty Forum – Before the faculty meeting, Prinicpal sends it out.
Trainings – Beginning of the year 3 hours, 1 and 1/2 for veterans. The Moodle trainers (two teachers) and then ICT trainer. Give a stipend to those mentors.
Cyber Cafe – One time per week, not required for teachers to go to. This is a PD for tech stuff.
One problem is too many things going on and too many portals for people to access.
Upper School Calendar for Homework – Portal for parents (Principal and Counselor) – Talk to teachers –
One portal – email/calendars/
One portal – Moodlic
One portal – WebEIM (or alternative Admin Software)
Teachers self police and no administrator moving through the pages to see who is doing them.
Leadership Team Course Excellent!
When a student enrolls, they fill out a form allow their children to be photographed on put on the website.
Teachers need to de-clutter their documents on their moodle pages as the years go by.
Our facilitator today is John Mikton. I’ll be blogging my notes from the conference. He is from Geneva, Switzerland and the Technology Director at the International School Prague. He is an experienced educator who has worked in China, Switzerland, Japan, and Tanzania. Before teaching, he worked in advertising. He is an inspirational speaker and I am looking forward to spending the next two days with him. Here is a link to his website.
“Change is not merely necessary to life- it is life.” Alvin Toffler
Did You Know? We watched the video, “Did You Know” which is the latest version of “Shift Happens.” Some of the interesting facts presented were as follows:
There are 31 billion searches on Google every month. In 2006 it was 2 billion.
A NY Times daily edition has more information than a person in the 1700’s was exposed to in a lifetime.
Twitter: I helped Nadia and Janna to learn a bit about Twitter and to get accounts. It is interesting that adults use twitter much more than teenagers. I downloaded “TweetDeck” so I can have twitter on my desktop without being logged into the twitter page.
Creators and Interactive: Good point made by John, that adults are the “gatekeepers” for the teenagers creating content on line. When his school did the 1-to-1 lap top program they gave the computers to the PARENT, not directly to the students. The message was, the school is lending a computer to the parent who will let the child use it. Young people at times need this before that put stuff up online.
Strategies With Teachers Working On Laptops: Little strategies to assist teachers when students have laptops in class.
Laptops are in a circle and facing out so teacher can see.
Turn off the airport.
Flip down the monitor.
Software that allows teacher to view the student screens. Can bring it up in front of the class.
Thinking
Daniel PinkAuthor of the “A Whole New Mind: Why Right Brainers Will Rule the Future?” ( and we are moving to a conceptual age. There are six minds and 6 essential senses of the future:
1) Design – Moving beyond
2) Story
3) Symphony
4) Empathy
5) Play – Bringing humor to businesses and products
6) Meaning
This is similar to Howard Gardner’s latest book.
I lost a bit of my notes from losing the connection. We watched a couple of segments from “Growing Up Online” a documentary about teens and the internet. One pertinent idea, that the divide between generations is the biggest since the invention of television. The issue of privacy is huge in international schools. It is important to view privacy also in the lenses of different cultures. For example, US parents would want the school to act upon students outside of school spraying grafitti on a wall in the city. European parents might feel not to have the school involved.
How do I safeguard my privacy?
Some of my photos in our flickr.com account are private.
I don’t put my credit card information, phone number, address.
There are some things in my life I do not blog about.
My wife screens photos of her that I want to post on line.
I try not to blog about my future schedule, giving times and places where I will be.
Facebook – The default settings for facebook are open publicly. You need to be 13 years old to have a facebook page. John’s advice for facebook is below:
Facebook Safety Tips
The following safety tips are important to keep in mind, whether you are using Facebook or one of the other social networking sites:
Don’t reveal your password to anyone.
Check your privacy settings on a regular basis, and make sure that they accurately reflect your level of comfort.
Don’t reveal any personal information to someone you are communicating with online. Personal information includes your real name, address, phone number, and credit card information. It’s not a good idea to reveal where you work or go to school, either, since this information can be used by Internet stalkers to locate you.
Anything you post online can be read by anyone who visits that Web site. Consider that this information can be seen by your parents, the police, or a current or prospective employer. If you are not sure you want the information shared with any of them, don’ t post it.
People you are interacting with online may not be who they say they are.
Exercise extreme caution if you decide to meet someone in person you have been interacting with online. Arrange to meet in a public place, and don’t go alone.
Report any violations of Facebook’s terms of use immediately.
Any inappropriate communication should also be reported to Facebook administrators promptly.
Next topic is Cyber Bullying. This has been around for a long time. The tool they use is different. John showed us two public service announcements from
There is no good blocking software, the best method is to educate yourself and to engage your children in learning about the dangers.
Many of the themes of Digital Citizenship are very important.
1) Digital Health and Wellness – Are we providing the right kind of chairs, should age 4 students have microwaves from cell phones in their ears.
2) Digital Law – Hacking and sending nude photos are two things teens may do that they are not aware of the consequences.
Other topics – Do not blame it on the computer, the problem is social and cultural.
Case Studies –
1) Student steals password and username from another student and harasses a teacher on Moodlic.
Expel from the school because teacher involved and clearly against our Acceptable Use Policy.
2) Group of students posts videos on youtube of them drinking, insulting passengers on train and all students are underage.
School did nothing, parent contacted police, and they were punished by local authorities.
3) Student has different identities online, which are diff gender, traits, etc.
Conversation, but no official punishment from the school.
My overriding principle is to inform the parents because I would like to know if it were my son or daughter involved in one of the above. It is another question of school punishment or not.
On Saturday I took Owen and Oliver with me on the CAS hiking trip. CAS stands for Creativity, Action, Service and is part of our International Bacchlaureate program at our school. One of the seniors, Luka, is an avid hiker and he planned out a great route for us. The trail is part of a larger system of trails in Serbia and there are hiking clubs here. Trying to find basic information about them is difficult and I haven’t seen any maps. Because of Serbia’s isolation for many years, these types of things aren’t developed yet for tourists.
The hike took place outside of the village of Slavkovica, which is located north of Čačak. It is part of the central Serbian region known as Šumadija (Wooded Land). The land of Sumadija is a mix of rolling hills, pastures, pine and deciduous forests, villages, and orchards. The hike contained all of these and was a very pleasant day. This specific hike and village are not mentioned in the Bradt guide to Serbia. The route began at a restaurant, and it was under 2 hours from Belgrade.
The high school students were patient and kind to the boys and they loved hanging out with the high schoolers. I had to carry Oliver in some of the parts, but both of them did very well. We hiked from 10:30 AM until 5:00 PM and they kept up the entire way.
Owen Overlooks a Beautiful Wooded Valley
Šumadija being central Serbia, was and is the most “Serbian” part of Serbia. The two uprisings against the Turks started here as well as resistance to the Nazis in WWII. It was the center of the Belgrade Pashalik in Ottoman times. I think at its heart, Serbia identifies itself with the small family farm. Although Belgrade is cosmopolitian, many Belgraders have relatives still living in the countryside.
Vrh Suvogora (Dry Hill Peak)
The trail is well marked, although there were several trails intersecting that might be confusing. Red and white circles and signs (above) guide hikers. You need to read Cyrillic and the top sign indicates the direction of our goal. A WWI battle occured at Suvagora Summit between the Serbs and the Austro-Hungarians. There were several parties of hikers and there is the occasional farmer or local that you can ask if you get lost. We spotted some hang gliders on the way back.
And with many of my hikes with Oliver, it ended up with him falling asleep on my shoulders as we headed down the final decline to the car.
I didn’t think it was possible, but Ocean is getting cuter! Look at those pigtails. I am totally in love with her. Last night I was carrying her down to the car as we were heading off to the store for our weekly grocery shopping, and she was giving me kisses and caresses and saying, “ah tata.” I never got that from the boys.
It was a very busy week with two Open House nights and the usual demands of managing an international IBO secondary school. I did get a chance however, to play with the kids a bit and what privilege that is. The weather has been great and it allowed us to play catch in the back yard. If there is a heaven, I would want it to be full of moments like this. Owen is really getting good and Ollie has a good arm on him. I fondly remember the Kralovec family Sunday night batting practice with my Mom and Dad and brothers. I hope to carry on the tradition with playing a lot of sports with my children.
Ollie has an exuberance for life!
I am a very lucky man to have such a wonderful family.
Serbia tied France 1-1 in the Group 7 World Cup Qualifying match tonight to maintain their four point advantage over France in the group. Serbia has two games left and a win in one of them, clinches a spot. On a side note, former Yugoslavian republics Slovenia, Bosnia-Hergovina, and Croatia are all currently second in their respective qualifying groups. I wonder if a Yugoslavia team would be a powerhouse with an All-Star selection from those teams?
Serbian Soccer Coach With the Team's Mascot (The White Eagles)
Novak Djokovic defeated Spaniard Fernando Verdasco to make it again to the US Open Tennis Championship Semifinals in New York. He won in four sets and waits to take on either Federer or Soderling, in what may be a classic match.
Nole Serves In his Win Today Against Verdasco
The national basketball team defeated Great Britian 77-59 to move into the qualifying round. The win got them out of the preliminary round with 3 of the 4 teams in their group moving on. The European basketball championship is taking place in Poland this month.
And finally, Serbia defeated Finland 3-0 in the Men’s European Volleyball Championship in Turkey tonight. They are in the playoff round and play Holland tomorrow night.
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