Estonian team meeting in Pärnu, Estonia

On the 18th of April, the Estonian team met again in Pärnu, at Pärnu Kesklinna kindergarten. There, Meeli and Merike first introduced us to their workplace. It was nice to see that each group had their own little shed, where they kept toys and tools for playing as it allows children to enjoy playing and learning outdoors in any weather. The yard area was very biodiverse, with all plant mapped and labelled in both Estonian and Latin.

After the tour of the kindergarten, we sat down and shared our experiences with the activities and plans we have carried out so far. For example, Krista introduced to us the game she made herself, which we proceeded to play together. As we were in a different kindergarten, we used four pictures of potted plants instead of potted plants themselves and everyone was told to pull an item from a basket. The item could be a picture, a characteristic attribute of a plant or a plant name, and then the task was to bring it to the right picture of the potted plant. At the end of the game, we checked the answers ― this game is well suited for ending a lesson to ensure information retention. Before we left the kindergarten, Meeli and Merike had also prepared a small orienteering game in their own yard area, which was great fun.

After our lunch break, we headed to Pärnu Kuningatänava Basic School, where we also heard a little bit about the history of the school and then gathered in a classroom to continue our team meeting. The meeting was started by Kadi Hirv, who introduced us to tools that can make a Power Point presentation more exciting and also how to make games with it. Karin introduced Globisense Labdisc, an environmental data collector that can be used both in natural and urban environments. For example, environmental data collector can be used to measure distances, relative humidity, surface temperature, outside temperature, sound level, etc.

At the end of the session, we continued to experience share, and formed a group of teachers and kindergarten teachers to make two lesson plans together, which we can use in our daily work.