How Important are Intergenerational Programs in Today's Schools?

Abstract

Today, our lifestyles have changed, and children are less likely to interact with older family members and other older adults. Intergenerational programs in the schools provide opportunities, Mr. Hopkins reminds us, to bring the generations together - and the rewards will surely justify the time spent. DO YOU remember when you were a child getting together with large numbers of family members and other adults for celebrations and holidays? you remember the little old ladies who used to pinch your cheek and say how much you looked like your mother or father? We never thought of it then, but those gatherings were what today would be called intergenerational programs. Today's children are likely to have families spread out over different cities, states, or even countries. As a result, in many cases, their opportunities to regularly spend time with older adults have diminished. Intergenerational programs fill an important gap in the lives of many children, and they also help break down the stereotypes held by young and old alike. Not all teens are scatterbrained or dangerous, and not all elderly people are frail or grumpy. Intergenerational programs encourage mutual understanding and respect between generations. They give children positive role models and break down barriers created by fear and uncertainty. They give older adults needed feelings of accomplishment, worth, and joy. They offer both groups a medium through which they can share their talents and experiences. Recently, I was fortunate to be a participant in the Senior Pen Pal program developed by the Community Agency for Senior Citizens (CASC). As part of the program, students in Fran Berardocco's third-grade class at P.S. 45 on Staten Island wrote letters to they had never met. CASC distributed these letters to any interested older adults who were willing to answer them. The project encouraged communication between the generations, shed some light on conceptions that young and old have of one another, and offered the members of both generations an opportunity to develop their writing skills. When I visited the class at the start of the project, it was clear that many of the 8-year-olds did not know what a citizen was. One little boy asked, What do they do all day? Another wondered, Do they like spaghetti? Still another asked, Do any of them come from England? I don't know where the questions came from, but it was clear, despite the fact that most of them had grandparents, that many thought senior citizens were strange, mysterious creatures from another age. In the letters the children wrote to their pen pals, under Ms. Berardocco's direction, guidance, and instruction, the students introduced themselves and told a little about their classroom activities, their families, and upcoming classroom events. They also drew pictures of themselves and asked some questions of the seniors. These questions were revealing in a number of ways. Some of the children wanted to know what hobbies their pen pals had or how many people were in their families. They wanted to know whether the seniors they were writing to lived in their own homes or in a nursing home, whether they liked sports, what they liked to eat, and what they liked to do all day. The letters the seniors sent back to the third-graders universally emphasized how important reading is in their lives. Some encouraged the children to pursue their computer skills. The children might have been surprised when they read the letters and found their pen pals had traveled to such interesting places as Atlantic City, Pennsylvania, Disneyland, Minnesota, California, Aruba, Hawaii, England, Ireland, France, Spain, Algeria, Turkey, and Italy. Geography lessons in third grade thus took on a new level of interest. Listening to the students and reading through their letters, one could see the children's uncertainty about who these older people actually were. …