Community Problem Solvers bridging generation gap
By GuestThe Canton Community Problem Solving Team BRIDGES recently completed its fifth oral history interview of senior citizens in Canton. Galvin Middle School students Bella Botelho, Mary Kelley, and Carly LaFrance along with Hansen Elementary fifth grader Emily Kelley have been at it since last October.
The BRIDGES team interviews Canton senior John Friel.
BRIDGES stands for “Building Relationships in Diverse Generations Entails Sharing” and was inspired by a friendship with an elderly neighbor in Maine. The now 93-year-old Silver and Bronze Star recipient had long fascinated the Kelley sisters with his stories of being a spy in World War II, dropped behind enemy lines in France and hiding in haystacks from the Nazis.
When it came time to choose a topic for their Community Problem Solving project, they already knew what they wanted to focus on: sharing with their peers the fascinating life stories of seniors here in Canton. The Kelleys recruited friends Botelho and LaFrance, and after some fun with acronyms, BRIDGES was born.
Oral histories are often promoted around holiday time as students head off to family celebrations with grandparents, but the team wanted to highlight to their fellow students the stories waiting to be discovered in their own backyards, among friends, neighbors and in the larger community of Canton.
Canton Council on Aging Director Diane Tynan allowed the team to post a flyer, leave informational packets, and conduct the oral history interviews at the new Senior Center on Pleasant Street. All interviews are audiotaped with a digital recorder to be transcribed later.
Interviewees have included a civil rights activist who lived in Alabama during the desegregation crisis of the mid-1950s; an Air Force pilot who scanned radar looking for Russian aircraft at the height of the Cold War; a nurse from rural America who told girls from a texting generation about waiting for a party line to become free so her sweetheart could call on the shared telephone line; and an opera singer who performed at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center.
The team recently met with Elaine McCarthy, Social Studies Department coordinator at the Galvin Middle School, to discuss the possibility of incorporating more oral histories into the curriculum. Oral histories are currently part of the eighth grade Facing History unit, but the BRIDGES team hopes to introduce it to the sixth and seventh grades as well. Talks are also underway at the elementary level where teachers have expressed interest in bringing local seniors into the classroom.
“We didn’t realize when we started the project how much fun it would be,” said LaFrance. “The seniors have been fascinating,” added Botelho.
The team plans to publish all transcribed interviews in a book to be gifted to interviewees and also made available in the town history section of the library as well as at the Canton Historical Society. Plans are also underway for a senior/student dinner to be held at the school where students will be paired with seniors to conduct informal oral history or “sharing story” sessions.
Short URL: https://www.thecantoncitizen.com/?p=32718
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