Lecturing sensitive issues should be part of responsible teaching, but teachers need motivation. This is the key message of today’s webinar organized by the Centre for Civic Education (CCE) on “Anti-war and peace initiatives in Montenegro during the wars of the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia”.
Webinar gathered 20 teachers of history and social science subjects aiming to present a teaching manual on “Anti-war and peace initiatives in Montenegro during the wars of the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia “, as well as the manner of its implementation within the pedagogical practice.
Besides the current challenges of lecturing this and other sensitive issues from the recent past, the webinar focused on the methodological application, potential teaching material, and presentation of one workshop as a potential teaching model.
History teacher in Gymnasium “Tanasije Pejatović“ in Pljevlja, Violeta Stojkanović, think that “there are several reasons why such trainings are important. However, the primary reason is that lecturing on these issues still represents a challenge. Challenges should be approached in the best possible manner, and for such an approach continuous education of educational staff is needed. I hope that relevant institutions will be more receptive to this kind of training and that this and similar issues will be approached not as sensitive, but priority ones”.
Marija Vujošević, a history teacher in Gymnasium “Stojan Cerović” in Nikšić, considers that “value of such seminars is in the presentation of issues that contributes to the education of teachers themselves, primarily because of the exchange of ideas on how to integrate such issues into the curriculum and bring those in the right way in the classroom. Improving capacities of teachers leads to easier and more quality manner to create the ability of critical and multi-perspective perception of this and similar challenges within the pupils, and thus developing a sense of responsibility”.
Parallel to the webinar in Montenegro, a webinar was held in Serbia as well, and earlier the same webinar was held in Sarajevo within the History Fest. After the webinar for professors from Croatia, teaching material from the four countries will be available online.
The webinar is part of the project “Different Paths – Shared Values”, implemented by the Centre for Civic Education (CCE) in partnership with the Youth Initiative for Human Rights from Zagreb (YIHR), the Association for Modern History from Sarajevo, and the German foundations Forum Ziviler Friedensdienst (forumZFD) and Heinrich Böll Stiftung (HBS), with the financial support of the European Union through the programme Europe for Citizens.
Milos Vukanović, Advisor