practical living
a football club or hobbies. But we also like
to belong to family. If you think back to
the role of grandparents a few generations
ago, it was to look after the children while
the parents went out to work, or hunting
and gathering.
We’ve lost that in modern society. There
isn’t that link between children and their
grandparents in the same way. One of the
things we were attempting to do was to
bring children and older people back into
that, so those links could be established.
This is missing in so many families.
In the first episode, we saw that not all of
the residents were 100 per cent onboard
or fully interacting. Can they still feel the
benefits just by being in an area where
these things are going on?
There are benefits for everyone, even if
they’re just watching. It’s probably not a
spoiler to say people do get more involved
as the show goes on.
But this was something we weren’t sure
of when it started. We didn’t know how
many people would stay the distance, and
fortunately all of them do. Although we do
lose John in the middle, because he has to
go off and have a knee replacement. But to
see the joy when he comes back was really
amazing, both for the children, but also for
the older adults.
That’s one thing we didn’t expect in the
program: that relationships developed
between the older adults as well. These are
all people in the same retirement village,
yet they hardly knew each other, and there
was no relationship between them. When
they came together in this project, those
relationships developed and continued.
I think that was a positive that probably
wasn’t thought about at the beginning.
Everything was completely spontaneous.
There was no scripting in this at all. The
only supervision was deciding on what
activities the children and older people
would do that fitted in with the preschool
syllabus. That still had to happen.
It was all very spontaneous, and that’s
the joy of it. The way the cameras could
watch the children and their reactions. And
particularly, watching [one of the children]
Tyrone, when he’s looking at Brian, who’s
very grumpy, and he’s got his eyes shut.
You’re going to write about this for a
report. Does a produced television show
have any effects on the outcomes of a
scientific experiment?
That’s certainly an issue. However, in this
case, there were eight cameras and they
were hidden. The children weren’t seeing
the producers. There were carers, certainly,
from the preschool. There was Fiona, and a
couple of her assistants to keep an eye on
the kids, take them to the toilet and things
like that. But there was no prompting. This
was them standing back.
Only once or twice, when they’re
outside, where the cameras were obvious,
do you see the children talking to the
cameraman. But other than that, it was
all hidden. There might have been a little
bit of prompting from the assistants, but
not in the way of ‘Why don’t you go and
talk to Brian’. No, Tyrone was doing that
spontaneously, and I think it’s a lovely part
of the program.
If you watch it, you’ll see Brian start
smiling and opening up, whereas he
looked to be in a deep depression just
before that.
There were some comments from Tyrone’s
parents near the start and they say, “He’s
a very soft soul.” There is that wonderful
empathy. You also see it develop in some
of the other children during the show.
That’s one of the lovely things, the way
the children developed as well in this
program. There were benefits to them in
terms of confidence and the interactions
with others. And it was really good for
both, and the development of empathy.
A big part of the episode was stressing
the importance of the mental
stimulation, so that residents aren’t
switched off mentally for 20 hours a
day. Could we see similar results or
better results away from this series with
teenagers or uni students interacting
with residents, as they might provide
more intellectual stimulation?
It would be interesting to see how the
different age groups work. I suspect it will
be very much horses for courses, because
there would be some people, some
teenagers and uni students, who would
interact very well with John, I imagine,
who’s very well read and quite educated.
However, John would be quite different
to, say, Shirley. And she would be different
to Maureen, who was a kindergarten
teacher in her earlier life. They would all
be different.
There is something about little ones,
though – four and five-year-olds. They’re
not judgemental. They just see older
people as another person. We’re hoping
this might also address some of the issues
around ageism.
And it would be interesting to see uni
students interacting. And we do see it with
medical students. When we get them to
go speak to older people, they come back
and say, “Wow, that was so interesting. He
knows so much about this or that.” At other
times, they probably just said, “Oh, they’re a
couple of old farts.”
When they actually get to know them
more closely, more intimately, they
discover that they’re people too, and
they’ve got fantastic experiences. I think
it will be lovely to see a little bit more of
that developing.
What are the potential implications of
your study for aged care?
I think the implications for aged care are
that we’ve now got a clear indication of
how you can do it. My one caveat would
be to say it’s quite complicated to do with
preschool children because you’ve got to
do things like police checks and you’ve got
transport issues.
We’re looking very much at perhaps
encouraging playgroups to do their
activities in an aged care facility, where
there is appropriate space. Then, you’ve
got two kinds of intergenerational care,
because you’ve got the parents of the little
ones there as well.
And you don’t have quite the same
supervision issues, or the need to do
Working with Children Checks, and all
the stuff that sits behind these sorts of
programs. There are lots of suggestions,
I think, that will come out of this show.
We have colleagues at Griffith
University who’ve done work in this area.
I was involved with them some years ago,
which is how I got interested in the whole
concept. This group have published a lot
of their work. They show the business
side of this: the costs, the different
models. That will be useful for aged care
facilities that have to decide what to do.
The other thing is, if you’re building a
new facility or renovating, think about
building a childcare centre or some sort of
facility that can be used as one. We need
more childcare – we’re hearing that all
the time. We need more aged care and
particularly the day activities. We don’t
want people sitting for 20 hours in their
room if there are other things to do.
It’s about thinking ahead: “How can we
improve what we’re doing now in terms of
aged care, in terms of accommodation and
the environment?” ■
* Old People’s Home For 4 Year Olds is
available to watch on the ABC’s iview app.
agedcareinsite.com.au 21