On Monday, 8 May, Savremena’s students set off for an adventure which led them from prehistory and dinosaurs to the modern time. They visited the Svilajnac Natural History Centre and the Pokajnica monastery, located about 90 kilometres from Belgrade.

With an imaginary time-travelling machine to the dinosaur age

Savremena’s students were delighted by the content provided by the Svilajnac Natural History Centre, and the exhibition showing the creation of the planet allowed them to go far back in history.

“Dinosaur World” and the “Dinosville“ park were both fun and informative for our students. What impressed them the most were the replicas of dinosaur skeletons, where they got acquainted with the basics of palaeontology and evolution and compared them to the skeletons of the animals that still exist.

The students noticed the difference between the habitats and structure of organisms, learned how the environment could have an impact on evolutionary directions, and also enriched their knowledge about how humans advanced and went a long way from hominids to modern humans.

The next attraction that Savremena’s students found particularly fun was the visit to the “Dinosville“ park, where they felt like a part of Jurassic park while walking among the dinosaurs. At this very spot, the students realised the difference between epoch and period and learned
how organisms and the environment changed with time, and how great extinctions affected the directions of evolution.

Discovering the secrets of the planet

On this journey, Savremena’s students had the chance to see a few interesting exhibitions.

The exhibition “The world of minerals and rocks” introduced the students to minerals and rocks
our planet consists of. Jadarite, so far the only mineral found in our country, was one of the most attractive showpieces due to the fact that its chemical composition coincides with the well-known kryptonite from the Superman comic books.

The “Biodiversity of Serbia” exhibition showed Savremena’s students the natural resources of Serbia in an authentic manner, and the exhibition about meteorites called “Space rocks” fascinated them with three replicas of important meteorites which fell on the surface of our country. The exhibition “Bioarchaeology of Đerdap”, which describes the approximately 10,000-year-old settlement, didn’t go unnoticed either, while at the exhibition “Witnesses of the Ice Age”, the students were able to see impressive examples of megafaunas, which, during the last Ice Age, lived on the territory of today’s Serbia, but went extinct some 10,000 years ago. This exhibition was particularly interesting to them.

Unforgettable history and biology lesson

Savremena’s students also visited the Pokajnica monastery, located in the vicinity of Velika Plana, where they heard the story of the betrayal and death of Karađorđe, one of the best-known historic figures. In late April, Pokajnica marked 200 years since his murder and is one of the best preserved churches from that period.

On this location, history teacher Sanja Bogdanović explained the students why it was strategically important for towns to be located near rivers and how rulers had used the towns’ locations, while biology teacher Nadežda Golubović taught them which wild animals inhabited this region (deer, boars, foxes), and that the Morava river is abundant in species protected by the law.

The history and biology lessons on this location were an excellent opportunity for students to see everything they had learned about at school. An exciting journey from prehistoric times and dinosaurs to more recent history allowed Savremena’s students a truly different and practical revision of the lessons covered at school.

More pictures in our gallery.