Languages United is supporting professional development in Croatia

Languages United has just completed a professional development course for university professors from Croatia. The three professors, who specialise in early years education and lecture at the University of Slavonski Brod, have gained so much from this experience. The programme incorporated observation lectures at Bath Spa University in the morning with an English language course for professional development in the afternoon.

Cultural exchange was an important part of this project, so the professors were taken on a tour of Bath and visited the Roman Baths, Stonehenge, London and Bristol. It was an enriching and inspiring week packed with action.

The course participants all stayed in one of our carefully selected homestays, all three of them in one host family, in single rooms, with a private bathroom, which helped them with their own team building, coordinating the logistics of the day, and exchanging impressions. Our wonderful hosts were so supportive and provided them with a wonderful insight into British family life. Plenty of discussions and extended learning in real-life situations.

On the final day, the course participants delivered presentations, focusing on what they had learnt from the experience and comparing the UK and the Croatian Early Years education.

They returned home exhausted but very inspired to try new things and new ideas. We were delighted to get this message from them:

"Dear friends,
our stay in Bath passed too quickly. We think you are the most responsible for that 😉. We want to thank you for the organization, great help, cooperation, compassion and all the good energy we received from you. We hope to see you again and continue our collaboration. This valuable experience has opened some new horizons in our personal and business lives. We wish you all the best and hope that one day we will have the opportunity to reciprocate and host you in our homeland."

Languages United is continuing to look for ways of collaborating with teachers around the world to assist their personal development. This latest course adds to our extensive experience, which includes working with teachers in Georgia (PRELIM1) and Peru (PRELIM2).

If you have a teacher development project or would like more information on our work with international teachers, please visit their web page to find out more.