Kissing it Better: Bringing Generations Together

At Kissing it Better, we believe that bringing the generations together could go some way to solving the problem of loneliness. Every day, across the country, our young volunteers meet with older people on Zoom or in real life to have fun, to learn new things and to reminisce about old things. Young and old laugh together, sing together, play board games together and even read funny play scripts out loud. We have emails from hundreds of young people who say they feel more connected to their community because of our work.

These sessions show young people that they can have fulfilling – and fun – friendships with people born in a very different time. When young and old get together, everybody benefits. The older people feel valued and cared for, and the younger ones feel a new sense of purpose. They also learn that real life is not as scary as they thought: there’s nothing like a chat with an 85-year-old to put things into a very different perspective.

We’re now working with children from as young as five years old, showing them how to make deep and caring connections with the older people in their lives. Our primary school workshop, ‘When Great Granny Came to Stay’, helps young children understand what it’s like to be old in a rapidly-changing modern world. These fun and imaginative sessions also teach young children thoughtful ways to show older relatives and family friends that they care.  

In the past 12 months, we have taught more than 7,000 children in our ‘Great Granny’ workshops. After the sessions, the children can use their learning to make their older relatives feel a bit more special. But we don’t stop there: once a school has completed our workshop, we set up KiB clubs to link them to local care homes and day centres, so the children get the chance to light up the day for older people in their community too. Working together with DCHC, our plan is to pilot some workshops in Devon schools and then link them with Devon care homes. There will be more information on this in the coming months.

In the past year, we have also connected with more than 6,000 secondary school and university students through our Zoom teaching and volunteering programmes. Our online interactive volunteering programme allows young people to ‘visit’ older people in care settings, or living alone in their own homes.

We also have a range of KiB Calendars, listing events and activities for older people and their carers. We issue them free to carers groups and GPs at various points across the country.

Modern life is hard to negotiate for a hundred different reasons. Just one example: about 20 years ago, the ‘Stranger Danger’ idea took hold, and parents started teaching their children never to talk to strangers. Of course this is a good thing for the safety and security of children, but the message young children hear is that there is danger everywhere and other people are scary. Making friends with older people, through safe secure KiB sessions, offsets the negative associations and brings everyone a bit closer together.