What if we stopped separating generations?
“We have so much more in common than society would have us believe.”
– Gina Haebich
In this conversation, social worker and Joining Generations founder, Gina Haebich, shares the magic that happens when generations are brought together, the commonalities that emerge despite differences in age, and why it’s so important to weave more of these interactions into the fabric of everyday life.
Anna:
Well hello! So maybe just to start, could you give us the story of Joining Generations and why you started it?
Gina:
We started, well really the start of this year, but I have previously been working in running intergenerational programs for a few years. So we’re fairly new, we’re a small social enterprise. It’s myself and a little group of volunteers and we run a range of programs. A big inspiration for me was watching the ABC show Old People’s Home for Four Year Olds back in COVID times. And then I had the opportunity to set up an inter-gen program with my local council between their kindergarten and their social program for older adults. And it was really that experience that made me feel like I want to go into this area. I’ve been working as a social worker in community services for about 20 years, and this is the first time that I felt really excited. Just seeing the connections between the children and the elders really made me feel like I want to do more of this, I want to be working in community creating more of these connections between generations.
So we run a few different streams of programs. One of them is a friendship program between kindergartens and aged care homes in Naarm, Melbourne. We run a structured program where the children visit once a week and it’s the same group of children, the same group of elder residents, and the sessions are facilitated. The aged care workers and the teachers will take turns leading the sessions with our support. We start and end with songs, and we choose songs that both the children and the elder residents know. They’ll do things like art and craft, we play different games and we always incorporate story time as well, whether that’s one or two residents taking turns to read to the whole group or breaking into pairs or small groups and reading together.
Anna:
I know it’s probably hard to pinpoint, but what was it that you saw in those interactions between young and older people that excited you so much and made you feel that this was something you wanted to dedicate yourself to in that way?
Gina:
I’ve worked with children and young people and I’ve worked with older adults and that’s always been separate, and seeing them come together and seeing the level of connection and the level of joy that they brought each other was really very moving. I was just running a program last week in a Greek aged care home and there’s a couple of residents who are really very withdrawn. But then as soon as the children come, they’re laughing and talking and engaging and it’s just like they’re a different person. And likewise with the children.
I’ve seen a retired teacher in her eighties connect with this young boy who was mainly nonverbal but she just had this lovely way of engaging with him. She was able to communicate with him, and over a 10-week program, they became so close. And one session, she was running late and he wouldn’t start the activity until she was there. As soon as I saw his grandfriend come in, he raced up to her and put all the materials onto her lap and they started doing it together.
And some of the teachers, the early childhood teachers talk about the quality of presence and patience and attention that the grandfriends bring, that the children a lot of the time don’t get from the adults in their lives.
Anna:
It’s so beautiful. And I think it’s so true, isn’t it? There is just that different nature of time and interaction that can emerge in some of these programs and I’ve definitely seen that too. Can you tell us about the other ways you facilitate these kinds of intergenerational connections?
Gina:
So our other stream of program is the Intergenerational Community Dinners, which we’ve been partnering with Good Flock to run this year. They bring between five to six generations together around the table for a meal and conversation, and it’s people who don’t know each other. The concept is based on a US movement called Generations Over Dinner and the whole mission is to try and spread these dinners around the world, so our organisation thought how can we do this? We’ve been holding them at a local community centre, so it’s often people who live nearby. And it’s about coming together in a really intentional way to have conversation with people that you wouldn’t normally otherwise engage with and learning about who they are as people beyond their age, moving through the stereotypes that I think a lot of us have unconsciously taken on from media and society messaging. So it’s really trying to break down some of those stereotypes and just find what we all have in common.
Anna:
And so that’s just one meal, right? People who’ve never met each other sitting around the table, sharing one meal. In that short amount of time, what have you seen transpire between those people in terms of the shifts that it creates for them?
Gina:
I think I was surprised the first couple of dinners how deeply people went in, and the level of connection and stories that people were sharing from their own lives. And I remember at the first dinner, one of the questions prompts was can you share a stereotype or misconception that people have about your generation? There were ten of us at the table, and each person shared how their own experience and the experiences of their peers differed so wildly from the stereotype about their generation. And I think as people were sharing, everyone around the table was starting to see, actually, we have so much more in common than society would have us believe.
Anna:
I’m curious to hear more about what were some of those things that came up, the stereotypes that people named.
Gina:
Someone from the Baby Boomer Generation said, I just feel really upset that everyone thinks that we’re homeowning, rich people, hoarding the wealth. And she just said, that’s not my experience at all and none of my peers are in that situation and actually a lot of people that I know are struggling financially. She went on to talk about all the ways that her generation has contributed and made things better for future generations and that led to a whole table sharing.
The eldest at the table in his mid-80s talked about what it was like to build society and lay the groundwork after the world wars. And that he had a sense of pride in that. And then people in their fifties who belonged to Generation X were talking about the gains that they’d made around workplace rights and women’s rights and all sorts of civil liberties that they really saw their generation had a role in. And then there was someone at the table in their mid-twenties, Gen Y, saying, we get told that we’re snowflakes and that we just don’t care about the world, and that we’re always on our phones, and they were saying, you know, we feel like we’ve contributed a level of mental health literacy and openness around mental health. And also really contributing to understandings of gender diversity and sexual diversity and general diversity and inclusion.
And then the person in their 80s was saying, yes, actually, I’ve learned so much from you and your cohort of young people, it’s really opened my eyes, and I’m really thankful for that. And so people started kind of just spontaneously thanking each other for what they contributed and there was this real sense of cohesion, like there was something tying us all together. Everyone had made a contribution and had also benefited from others’ contributions. This sense of solidarity and just closeness – it was amazing. It was a two and a half hour dinner and someone at the end of the dinner said, I haven’t felt that listened to and that seen in a very long time.
Anna:
There’s also really something in that piece around that cycle back from the younger generation to the older and that sense of the learning that’s continuing and the development that’s continuing even for those older people around the table, which, you know, again is sort of counter to the narratives we’re fed around older age being a time of decline and where you’re not learning and there isn’t this sort of expansion into new possibilities. I love that that man’s talking about the things that he’s discovering and learning now.
Gina:
Yes, absolutely. And I know that at least a couple of the younger guests were really inspired by him. I think that’s another really important kind of indirect message that ageing can look very different to the message that we’re often fed. And that it can be one of growth and richness and connection.
Anna:
And I guess that sort of feeds into, you know, this sense of possibility and, how else things could be. I’d love to hear at a big picture, what’s your vision for the future of ageing and intergenerational connection that sort of drives you, and how would you articulate that?
Gina:
That’s a big question. I think that ultimately it’s about creating much more opportunity for people of all ages to just naturally be able to connect and develop relationships and help one another provide support. But I’m keen to see what’s beyond that and how do we embed some of these structures into our communities so that connection is easy and it’s not something that we have to design programs for and need funding for and all of those things. My kind of bigger vision, which probably aligns with where you’re coming from too, is that we rebuild the way that we used to live in society and that non Western societies still live, with those strong intergenerational connections just built into our everyday life, into our workplaces and family lives and homes.
I think we have a lot to learn from First Nations communities here and overseas as well, who are still living in those ways and valuing those ways of being in community and relationship with one another.
Anna:
While we are working towards that, there is still this really important role for programs and initiatives. I’m curious what’s on your mind as you look to the future. With Joining Generations, are there ideas that you’re sitting on or bubbles of possibility kind of coming up that you could share?
Gina:
I think in terms of this next year, what we’re looking at is launching our fee for service program in aged care homes. So it’s called Giggle and Wiggle and it will be bringing children from zero to five years, with their caregiver into the care home and facilitating structured sessions. So similar to the kindergarten sessions, with lots of opportunities for interaction between the children and the elder residents.
So that’s a piece that we’re excited about and profits from that go back into providing programs and events that are free or low cost for community members. We’re really keen to keep going with the dinners too.
Anna:
Speaking of dinners, for those reading along, we’ve asked Gina if there might be an opportunity for her to share all her learnings around how to do these intergenerational dinners and how to facilitate them. And you’ve very graciously said yes. Do you want to tell us a little bit about what that will look like?
Gina:
Yeah, so I guess it’ll be an opportunity just to share our experiences of hosting the dinners and some of the learnings that we’ve had along the way ’cause it’s been, you know, a nice steep learning curve which is great. And each time we hold a dinner we learn more and keep adapting things as we go.
And just keen to have people come along who might be interested in or even curious about holding a dinner or attending a dinner because we’d really love to see these spread in the community. They’re something that doesn’t need heaps of planning or structure or heaps of funding. It can be as simple as inviting a group of neighbours and someone hosting and having a potluck dinner in their home.
We’d love other people to give it a go, and hopefully create a little network of people that are hosting dinners potentially around the country and support each other with ideas.
Anna:
Love that. If someone’s listening and they’re really inspired by what you’re doing and they wanna get involved or support in some way, what would your sort of message or invitation be at the moment?
Gina:
Please get in touch with us. You can jump on our website and you can sign up to our newsletter. And we will soon be adding a volunteer form too.
We’re launching an intergenerational storytime at a local library for Seniors Month in October. We’re partnering with the local U3A and care home as well to bring older adults into the library to engage in stories with the children and their parents. So there’s opportunities to be involved.
And if people just want to ask a question or have an idea they want to share, we’d love to hear from you.
