Best friends

Breaking the isolation of older people through intergenerational learning

Project period:  September 2020 – August 2022

Target group:
– Elderly people over 65
– Youngsters under 6
– Social workers
– Caretakers
Coordinator: Point Europa (UK)
Partners of the project: Pistes Solidaires (France), Point Europa (UK), Gulbene novada Pasvaldiba (Latvia), Symplexis (Greece), Kinderbetreuungseinrichtung Kindervilla (Austria), Centro per lo Sviluppo Creativo “Danilo Dolci” (Italy)
Website: see the website

The context:
In Europe, around 7,2% of the population confirm to never meet up with their friends or family, not even once a year. Loneliness can become one of the main health problems in Europe. It is the elderly who are more vulnerable to this issue. This innovative project aims at creating intergenerational learning tools in order to connect elderly people (65 years old and above) with young children (6 years old or younger) and to improve the physical and mental health of elderly people.

The objectives:
– To develop a comparative study between 6 European countries
– The creation of a training manual for social workers and caretakers
– The creation of a toolkit with intergenerational learning activities

The result:
Once the activities have been implemented, there will be a final pilot testing which will allow to verify the utility of the project and to disseminate the training manual and the toolkit to other possible interested people.