A two-day educational workshop for teachers of physical education and sports experts was held in Banja Junaković on 17th and 18th June 2019 within the framework of the “Support sport and physical activity of girls – ActiveGirls” project, which is being implemented under the Interreg IPA CBC Hungary-Serbia. The workshops were organized by the Provincial Secretariat for Sports and Youth, as the Lead Partner from Serbia, in cooperation with the European Affairs Fund of AP Vojvodina, as Project Partner.
The expert workshop was opened on behalf of the Provincial Secretariat for Sports and Youth, by Secretary Vladimir Batez, Marko Adamović, Project Manager, and on behalf of the European Affairs Fund of AP Vojvodina, Jovana Rapajić, Project Partner.
Secretary Batez pointed out that the idea behind the expert workshops, which involved a number of activities, was to improve the skills and competencies of sports professionals to be able to work with girls aged 7 to 15 years. The main question the expert workshops were to answer was how to motivate elementary-school girls to do sport and physical activities on a regular basis and how to keep them engaged in sport.
During the workshop, the research on barriers causing a low-level of physical activity of girls in AP Vojvodina was presented. The research was carried out by the Union Nikola Tesla University from Belgrade and conducted in Subotica, Sombor, Zrenjanin, Vrbas, which would give a closer look at girls’ motives and interest in sports in elementary schools in those municipalities.
During the two-day training course, the participants had the opportunity to get answers from the gathered project experts to the following questions: What are the differences between sports activities of girls and boys? How to help girls stay engaged in sports? Which sports are interesting to girls? What are the challenges in training girls? Motivation and positive examples. Moreover, the lecturers presented the results of the research conducted within the project, and the teaching material based on the research conclusions was distributed among the participants.
The next workshop for teachers of physical education and sports experts within the project will be held in Vrbas on 9th and 10th September 2019.