TOY Newsletter #19

Issue nr. 19 - 28/09/2020

Read about the changes we have made to the COVID-19 era version of the TOY Online Course about Intergenerational Learning. There are just three days left to register! Click here to join.

In this Newsletter we also feature a newly published social impact study of the London-based social enterprise InCommon, which brings 7 & 8 year olds together with older adults living in sheltered housing.

Latest News

Registration for TOY Online Course closes 30 September

Click here to register!

More than 200 learners from all round the world have already registered for this edition of the very popular 5-week self-paced TOY Online Course about intergenerational learning. Over the past 6 months many IG initiatives around the world have been busy adapting how they support contact between generations in the new reality, which is life with the COVID-19 pandemic.

The revised Course includes:

• New material and videos about about inclusive and multigenerational community-based early childhood education and care.

• New lessons, videos and forum discussions about intergenerational learning in times of COVID-19.

• An opportunity to contribute to the innovative social design Storytellers Project which links children and older adults via a robot.

• An interview with Ageless Play Australia about their experience participating in the TOY for Quality Programme in 2020.

The Course also includes all the usual popular lessons and videos that offer a mix of theory and practice about how young children and older adults learn and planning, organizing and evaluating IGL activities.

The ‘Additional Reading and Resources’ section at the end of each Unit has also been reorganized and updated to include both practice-focussed tools and academic articles.

The 4-Module Course begins on 5 October and ends on 8 November 2020.

Publications

A Year of Intergenerational Connection: the InCommon Social Impact Report

In 2017 two young London-based entrepreneurs, Laura Macartney and Charlotte Whitaker set up a social enterprise called InCommon, that aimed to boost wellbeing and tackle loneliness amongst older people.

How have they gone about this? By bringing together 7 & 8 year-old primary school children and older adults living in sheltered housing.

InCommon’s expansion to 13 projects across the greater London area in the very unusual 2019-2020 school year was the focus of a social impact study which was published last month. Written and researched by Dr. Ali Somers, the study report gives you insight into the participating children’s, older peoples’, and teachers’ perspectives before, during, and after participating in the facilitated IG sessions.

You can also read how the InCommon team piloted and successfully launched the online InCommon Buddies as soon as COVID-19 meant that in-person IG projects had to stop.

The study also drew on the TOY for Quality Programme in its benching of quality IG, noting that ‘the extent to which reflective practice is built in to ongoing project design and delivery can be a huge factor in determining the extent to which intergenerational learning is effective’.

Contacts

On the TOY website we commit to provide current and ground-making news, research and developments about the world of intergenerational learning involving young children and older adults. If you have a news item you would like to share with us, please contact us at:

International Child Development Initatives- ICDI

Margaret Kernan and Giulia Cortellesi

info@toyproject.net