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Bridging the Generation Gap
The importance of intergenerational activities
 
Left: Friendship Center seniors visit with second graders in their classroom as part of our intergenerational GOLD Project; Right: Program Manager and proud aunt Kathryn enjoys sharing her nephew with Friendship Center members when he comes to visit!
By Kathryn Cherkas
Program Manager, Friendship Center Montecito
When groups of young people visit Friendship Center, be they children or teenage students, I gather them for a little “pep talk” in the lobby before going in to meet our seniors. I tell them what they can expect to see or hear from this population and some pointers on starting conversations. Some of them are fidgety by now or even looking a little apprehensive.
This is when I turn on my extra-big friendly voice and say,
“Okay, everybody, listen–this is why you being here matters.”
Then I clue them in to this eminently important fact: As brain functioning changes in older people, especially with conditions like dementia, they might talk differently, walk differently, behave differently, or think differently. But despite that, underneath it all are a bunch of grandmas and grandpas, aunts and uncles, moms and dads, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters.
We’ve found that these titles carry a lot of importance with young people, as they are still in the stage of life where they rely upon parents and older relatives and identify themselves along relational lines. Hearing that they will be meeting “grandmas and grandpas” instead of “old people” seems to elicit respect and interest from the kids.
And the really vital point to get across to the kids is that these “grandmas and grandpas” will be so happy to see them!
“Intergenerational activities” is a fancy way to describe different generational groups spending time together. According to Erik Erikson, one of the first researchers to champion the benefits of contact between seniors and children, the similar developmental and sociological needs of children and seniors allow them to create unique relationships with multiple benefits for both groups.
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