My friend Mimi brought me along as she joined other senior citizens who had been invited to make a living history project with Weston Middle Schoolers.
Mimi is a Class A quiltmaker, and here she is spreading out one of her innovative creations, a coverlet with a native American theme, drawing oohs and aahs from around the big table.
However, sharing music across the generations was the main theme for the day. The gentleman in the foreground brought his keyboard, and was nearly oblivious to what was going on in the rest of the room as he gave lessons to his young friends. The boy in green, like several others, was videoing the activity on his ipad.
The girl in the white shirt is explaining into a recorder that she has brought hispanic music, to share her home culture. The teacher in the plaid shirt connected the ipod to a sound system, and no one could sit still to the jumpin' music.
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| The art teacher took stills. |
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| Again, note the videography. |
After the music session, which began to bring me up to date on what kids are into listening and creating dances to, we split into small groups so everyone could share stories from their childhood. At first it seemed that the shooting might interfere with storytelling, but as soon as Mimi lit into tales of her youth, all eyes were fixed on her. The academic point of this session was to try to give the children a living sense of how home life has evolved since the Great Depression-WWII era. But the mutual warmth and interest between the children and the adults was a delightful bonus.
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Back in the larger group, it was back into music AND
tales, some of them slightly on the "tall" side,
until the staff cheerfully shooed everyone out the door. |
I hope I get to see the final project, a video the children will compile recording
the series of bi-generational meetings between them and their older friends.
