8th national pedagogical forum with international participation „The European Dimension of Education“
5 July 2007, Stara Zagora
The department for information and in-service teacher training at the Thracian University Stara Zagora with director Professor Galya Kozhuharova organized for the 8th time the national pedagogical forum with international participation under the motto „The European Dimension of Education“. Also international guests from United Kingdom, Germany, Romania, Turkey and Russia were invited to the forum, but only Prof. Valerii Melezhik from the Russian Institute Pushkin attended personally the meeting, the contributions of the others were presented by their colleagues from DIPKU and the Thracian University. Under the moderators in the plenary session were representatives of the Centre for Control and Evaluation of the Quality of Education at the Bulgarian Ministry of Education, of the department for information and in-service teacher training at the “St. Climent Ohridski” university in Sofia and of the Institute for International Cooperation of the German Adult Education Association, Sofia (DVV International). Anelia Miteva form DVV International presented in particular the latest developments in the field of Lifelong Learning Policy at national and European level.
The afternoon part of the forum was organized in 3 parallel interactive sessions: “The model of the contemporary school for our children” for teachers and parents, “The school – sustainable, effective and cosmopolitan” for teachers and students, as well as the World Café under the motto “The career development of teachers”, targeted at teachers, school directors, university lecturers and experts form the Bulgarian Ministry of Education and facilitated by Valia Sharlanova – DIPKU Stara Zagora and Anelia Miteva form DVV International Sofia. The results from the 3 plenary sessions were presented in the form of sketches, posters and role plays. The final part of the forum was focused on the role of new technologies in education, and in particular on 2 IT educational products – a mathematic textbook, developed by DIPKU Stara Zafora and educational plays for children (Alphabet, Grammar, Eglish and others) developed by Sirma Media – the first Bulgarian publishing company for electronic multimedia products.
On the 4th July, beyond the official program of the forum, a special interactive training based on the “Open Space technology” was organized for a smaller group of the forum’s participants. The workshop was inspired by the upcoming European Year of Intercultural Dialogue 2008 and aimed at brain storming and development of concrete project proposal which can serve as the first step for applications at the European Commission by the 30th July 2007. Facilitator of the training was Anelia Miteva from DVV International Sofia.
