Jelena Angelovski's visit to our school

On Saturday 12th and Sunday 13th October, we had a pleasure of welcoming Jelena Angelovski, the author of the novel “Mika”.

On Saturday, Jelena presented her first novel “Mika” to the audience at the Bishop Nikolaj Hall. Through the excerpts from the novel she read, the audience learnt about the problem the main character, Mika, faces. He wonders “Who am I?”, after his best friend tells him he is “No one”. Mika is a boy from the Balkans who is growing up abroad and one of the main topics in the novel is his search for identity.

The book promotion was followed by a conversation on bilingualism and heritage language. It was led by Lena Poleksić, initiator and manager of the events with a keen interest in bilingualism, since she herself is raising two bilingual Serbian-English children.

The conversation touched upon bilingualism, but also biliteracy (focusing on the Serbian Cyrillic alphabet) and biculturalism. It also covered the discussion about identity, the role of an individual, as well as community in the preservation of the heritage language, alphabet and culture. Questions from the audience followed.

On Sunday, 13th October, Jelena Angelovski held workshops for the students of the “St. Sava” Sunday school. The workshops were entitled “Moja azbuka” (Azbuka – Serbian Cyrillic alphabet). Activities included group acting out of one excerpt from the book, solving activity sheets and a team effort to create “their own azbuka”. The students actively participated and contributed to the workshops.

Since everyone present at the workshops visibly enjoyed being involved, the workshops lasted for two hours (instead of initially planned one hour). Jelena kept the children interested, engaged and active. It was a great pleasure to observe how children enjoyed a different approach to learning, exposure to and acquisition of our beautiful language.

Huge thanks to Jelena for the beautiful, inspiring and content-filled weekend.

*These events are part of the project supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Serbia, Department for collaboration with diaspora and Serbian people in the region.

**Photos: Nenad Obradović