Savremena's students at the Global Game Jam

For the third year in a row, International School Savremena’s team attended the Global Game Jam which took place this weekend at the Nordeus Hub. The creative gaming team consisted of two teachers, Mathematics teacher and Art and Design teacher, and four students, Iva Živaljević, Jovana Petrović, Milica Petronijević and Mihailo Jovanović.

What is Global Game Jam all about?

Global Game Jam is a worldwide event that aims to create collaboration through a work project among people interested in the design of video or board games. Teams get together in event-hosted locations, and the topic is posted around the world at the same time. After that, teams have 48 hours to design and build a game (or at least a working prototype) until closing, and present it to other teams, as well as to post on the official Global Game Jam website.

Repair

This year's theme was "Repair" and our great young creative minds came up with the idea to create a table-top game where players take on the services of goblin-supermodels who want to get rich on commercials in their fantasy world. However, the advertising world is highly competitive and in order to advertise certain products they have to fulfill certain requirements in their appearance and "fix" their face with local alchemists. Advertisers are looking for horns, tentacles, technological aids and all sorts of things and the most competent actors will be selected for the role and earn a profit. The working name of the game is "Fortune Makeovers".

Savremena’s team presented the results and the working prototype at the closing of the event on Sunday at 6 PM in the Nordeus auditorium.

Making partnerships

The participants had the opportunity to get to know and see the work of the people in the Game Design industry and to get constructive feedback on their work from the people with very extensive experience in the industry. As an added bonus, Savremena’s team partnered up with the organisers who will visit International School Savremena in March and host a game design workshop. The team also secured participation in a follow-up event dedicated exclusively to young gaming designers (12-18) called Global Game Jam Next that takes place in June.

By participating at the Global Game Jam event Savremena’s teachers enabled the students to create their own meaning and context (through interpreting and adapting the theme), learn new skills and encourage social interaction through collaboration with the people in their team.

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.