Truly different English lessons for students attending the Combined Programme

Savremena’s students attending the Combined Programme enjoy the benefit of taking both National Programme and Cambridge International Programme subjects.

One of the exams taken by Year 12 students is AS Level English Language, which enables them to master the use of the English language in communication. The exam requires them to display excellent knowledge and writing skills, while the marking guidelines and criteria are set by the University of Cambridge.
This is why Savremena’s teachers know that it’s important to motivate students at the beginning of the school year so they could develop a positive attitude towards writing and understanding the importance of adopting literary and stylistic norms in English.

Savremena’s travel brochures for different target groups

One of the students’ first assignments was to design a travel brochure. This time, the task was not the destination, but the target group for the journey. Adapting the offer and the language to the target group is the idea behind the task, but also the challenge, as this part of the exam is called “Writing for an audience”.
In the lessons that preceded this project, the students covered the topic “Travel Brochure Writing and Vocabulary”, where they discussed the importance of promotional writing, the stylistic devices used to attract the readers’ attention, the sentence structures which affect the decisions of potential buyers, etc.
The project was also adapted to students attending online lessons. They designed the brochures using Google Slides or Canva, which allowed teacher Milica Aleksić to give them guidelines and follow their progress.
The students working in pairs were assigned different target groups – pensioners, young people aged 20–25, business people who want to organize conferences, families with small children, athletes, etc. This resulted in different locations, offers, food and leisure time options, price ranges and payment options. One group of students had a special task for World Space Week – to design a space travel offer.

Savremena’s students’ creative and interdisciplinary projects

Although we know that Savremena’s students are highly creative, they managed to surprise us once more. Not only did they meet the task criteria in order to design the brochures and perform the self-evaluation, but they also presented their offer to the class in a highly professional fashion.
After the presentations, they received feedback from their peers and the teacher regarding the positive aspects of their work and those that need improving, particularly in a linguistic sense, so they could achieve the best possible score in the exam.
The project also had an interdisciplinary dimension to it, as the students were marked on the design aspect of their work in Art & Design class.
Take a look at the students’ creative works.

I am extremely pleased and proud to be the parent of a Savremena student. During my first encounter with the school management, when I asked about my child’s potential enrolment, I saw how much love, enthusiasm and professionalism you put in your work. I was impressed by your approach, ideas and methods. I couldn’t believe something like this existed in our country! It doesn’t take long to realise that this is a school you would recommend to everyone. Creativity, modern technology, top-quality education, and most of all, the humaneness that can be seen throughout the school, make it truly different and worthy of its name – Savremena Gimnazija. With such an approach, the success of this school and, consequently, our children’s success, is unavoidable. Congratulations! Jelena Đorđević, Andrija’s mum
Contemporary in any sense of the word, our school offers functional knowledge and quality preparation for tertiary education in Serbia and abroad. Implementing modern and creative teaching in the classroom, where the teachers’ pedagogy and students’ performance are aligned with the highest academic standards for the high-school finals, our school develops linguistic, mathematical, scientific, artistic, cultural, technical and ICT competence, which is a prerequisite for further education and professional development. Teaching is supported by the interactive whiteboards and educational software, whereas practice exercises research and critical thinking.