Questionnaires on the Generation Gap

Questionnaire

v  A Kristin (Sweden), Lin (Sweden), Florentina (RO), Filip (Portugal)

1.       Are you aware of  any generation gap

Yes…No…Maybe

2.       Which of the following definitions on the generation gap do you think is  correct?

a.       …

b.      …

c.       ….

3.       In which point of peoples life do you  think the generation gap is the biggest?

13-15; 15-20;20-30;30-40;40-50;50-60;60-70;80-;

4.       In what area do you think the generation gap is the biggest?

Work   social life   politic   family   culture   economics   others

5.       When you are facing a generation gap issue, what do you do?

Talk about it             fight         run away           forget about

v  B.

1.       Do you agree there is  a problem between the older  and young generation?

Yes/No

2.       If yes, then what are the  signs?

a.       Not enough respect

b.      Lack of tolerance

c.       Different mentalities

d.      Different approach to technology

e.      Pace to life/ Conforming to accepted  society

3.       Are young people considerable reliable assets to society?

4.       Do you think the generation gap can be narrowed?

a.       Dialogue between generations (mixed  activities)?

b.      Education

c.       Projects like  this one?

d.      Help from the family ( Psychologists etc)

v  C

1.       Do you believe a generation gap exists?

2.       Gender( stronger amongst women or men)

3.       When do you consider that a generation gap changes?

4.       Do you think the generation allow the older generations to have more authority in their relationship s with younger people?

5.       How do you perceive an older/ younger person?

6.       Could the generation gap cause a problem in cause?

7.       Do you think your life is easier or harder than your parents’?

8.       What problems does  the generation gap cause  for you?

9.       Can it be overcome?

10.   How  do you believe we can overcome the generation gap?

v  D

1.       Do you believe that electronic means of communication create a communication gap between generations?

2.       Have you ever found yourself in a situation in which a young person /an elder was disrespectful to you?

3.       What situation would cause you to be disrespectful to a young/elder person?

4.       Which of the following reasons  do you believe is the main cause of disagreement between generations ( i.e. music, fashion, etc.)

5.       Do you find it easy to work in a team with people  from different generations?

6.       Is it easy for you to accept ideas from people of different generations?

7.       Do you believe that people of different generations have enough courage . self-confidence to openly state their opinions on members of other generations?

8.       Do you believe that people  of different generation can find common cultural ideas?

v  E

1.       How  do you understand GP?

2.       Do you feel it is  a problem?

3.       Do you think it  is  a challenge?

4.       What are the reasons of GP?

·         Technology; education; lifestyle; language; age; location; cultural changes.

5.       How  do you think people  around you face or understand GP?

6.       Is  what we call GP increasing or decreasing through ages?

7.       Which side ( elderly X youth) should make  more steps  about GP?

8.       Have you ever faced GP? How  did you feel?

9.       Do you think that  government or other  organizations could help  what is called  GP?

10.   What do you think we should  do to face GP?

v  F

1.       How many different generations  do you come across in your  everyday life?

2.       Do you have common activities with younger/ older people? ( tennis, Internet…)

3.       Do you have  a good  relationship  with your relatives? Who are they? How  old  are they?

4.       Do you tald  about your problems  with younger/older people?

5.       Do you often spend  time  with different generations?

6.       Why do you/ don’t you spend more  time  with different generations?

7.       Do you have many conflicts with the opposite  generation?

v  G Group 5 ( 5 positive, 5 negative)

1.       Young people don’t spend much time  with older people.

2.       Young & old people have harder time communicating today.

3.       Young & old people had more things in common back in the past.

4.       The young generation today has more opportunities & choices today.

5.       The generation gap  was greater in the past.

6.       Today technology is making it harder  to understand the younger people.

7.       Technology also makes  us get together more  an communicate in new ways ( Skype,  Facebook, mail)

v  H ( Sweden , Portugal Emilia)

1.       Do you feel frustrated  for little open mind in generation meetings?

2.       Does the other generation underestimate you?

3.       Is economy a problem  for communication?

4.       Is it difficult  to  work  with other  generations?

5.       Is there lack of  understanding towards  other  generations?

6.       Do you feel responsibility  for  other generation?

7.       Did  you, at  times, add actions for the generation gap?

8.       Have you got a lot  to learn  from other  generations?

9.       Is there respect from other generations?

10.   Do you  enjoy sharing time  with other  generations?

11.   Do you accept the other  generations?

12.   Are icons bridge builders?  Mother Teresa, UNICEF, Maradona, Ibrahimoviz, Jackson, Lady Gaga…

v  I

1.       What is generation gap?

2.       Do you  think generation gap is  a big issue in Europe?

3.       Do you think cooperation between generations  is needed to lower  the problems in the EU?

4.       Do you think gap can be positive or negative?

5.       Generation gap  now  and in the past ( Since   last year  has  it  increased  or not?)

6.       Does the generation gap affect the  relationship  among people?

7.       Why is  generation gap so big?

8.       Who is  most  affected  in  a negative  way  by the generation gap? Old people or  young people?

9.       What solutions  can you identify to solve  the problem of the generation gap?

10.   Do you think there should be more intergenerational  relationship  between people ? Is this  the right solution?

v  J

1.       To feel  at ease  when socializing  with other generations and hard  because  we do not share the same values

2.       I feel I do not  have  anything in common  with the other  generation

3.       I do not feel any need  to integrate  with  the other  generation

4.       I feel that the older generation has the authority to decide  over the young generation

5.       I feel I have a possibility  to meet  with the other generation

Feedbacks of participants

“ I liked  very much the group work activities”
“I thought it would be  boring, when I came here. But it wasn’t,  at all”.
“There is no generation gap here”
“It has been so interesting  meeting people  from   many European countries, to see different points  of view”
“We come  from different countries  but we share the same values”
“It is  so nice  to discover  how  other peoples  are”
“Nice  to connect mentally  with people  from other  countries”
“It is wonderful to be part of a mosaic of different nations , nice  and  smiling faces”
“ I felt privileged  to be together  with young people”
“It meant developing managerial skills  because  of the large number  of groups”
“It has been the first  time in my life  to be involved  this  way in  interactive  an socializing activities”
“A step forward in my  experience not only in the field of human relations but also in acquired  abilities and competences”
“I am happy I could  take two pensioners  with me; the joy of being together they felt 20 years  younger”
“I am happy  we faced different generations”
“It has been a real intergenerational meeting”
“The presentations  were made  with modesty  and seriousness”
“I have managed  to overcome my fears  of speaking in public”
“A real intercultural solidarity”
“This mixture of nationality and ages makes me feel a real European citizen”
“It has been an intergenerational  cocktail”
“I liked  the solidarity of the teams”

feecback about the second meeting in Verona

Feedback about our stay in Verona and our participation

in the project meeting – Spring 2012

The Hungarian participants came home some three days ago but I must say we are still full of our nice memories and experiences collected in Verona.

The city, the people, the weather, the hotel – everything really was past our expectations.

We think that this second meeting was a good step in the process of making new friends and putting down the foundations of further cooperation. During these three and a half days – although the group was really large - consisting of over 50 people – we could talk to nearly all of them not only about „business” but about their personal opinions, professional ideas and views on a lot of different issues.

It was especially interesting to meet the young people from some of the countries who – with the help of the interactive group activities – brought in their different viewpoints as well as their extra energy and high motivation.

We think that the proportion between strictly project- related activities and the s

o-called tourist programs was just correct, - due to the kindness and hospitality of our hosts, Marina, Ivo and Salvatore - we learned a lot about the region’s past and present as well as monuments and sights and – due to the presentations by the invited guests – we got some ideas about the problems and steps taken by the local authorities and institutions to solve them.

We must add one more important aspect, that of the number of project partners. Telling the truth we had had some discussions about how effective a partnership program with eleven partners can be – and we had doubts. Now we must admit that we were wrong. Due to the organizational skills of the project coordinator, Mariana, we can be efficient and produce what we had promised and what we think is important in order to complete this running project with success.

Now we have already started to look forward to meeting in Cyprus again and we hope that the meetings in the future will be as successful as the ones we have had so far.

Thank you all for the enthusiasm and energy you are putting into our joint efforts,

Kate and Andrew Fazekas

Hungary - Site 23 Ltd.

Feedbacks on the Work with RSES

Luminita Georgescu, sociologist

 One of the most exciting things  about working on this  study  was the team work activity  and  , again, the people I came across.

I personally  got  involved  both in collecting and in processing the  data.
My respondents were   unemployed  and jobless people.
I was simply astonished  to notice that they had great difficulties in understanding the scale  items, most probably  due to their poor education.
I could not refrain myself from  not  sharing this  experience  with my students  from Mihai Eminescu national College. It was  an excellent opportunity  for me  to draw their attention  upon the necessity of a very serious preoccupation  for education from their part  if they want to become successful in life.

Patricia Ghita, psychologist

After applying   the RSES in Transylvania Technical School,  I noticed that some of the students asked  for being counseled in order  to strengthen their self-esteem. Others  discovered  that after  answering the items they realized they do not know themselves so well, they are not aware of their  flaws  and qualities , the way they react towards  themselves  and  towards  the others.

The activity turned into an ample class counseling activity.

2nd Project Meeting

Verona  meeting  (7^th-11^th March 2012)
(working days: 8,9,10^th March 2012)
Agenda   
 

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Activities	Place
Wed  7th March 2012 Arrivals   and  accommodation at the  CENTRO CARRARO (Carraro Center) - Verona	Centro Carraro Lungadige Attiraglio, 45 - 37124 - Verona Tel. 045915877 Fax. 0458301929 www.centrocarraro.it
Thu  8th   March 2012 9:00- 9:30 Welcome! Europe’s Anthem Sung Together  ·         March, the month of revival and love. Traditions related  to  March 1st in Europe ·         March 8th – The Women’s International Day 9:30 -12:15   Working session Nr. 1 Checking the website ·         Dissemination of project contents. ·         Chek on the future meetings ·         Presentation of  the comparative analyses and conclusions drawn by all partners. ( 11 presentations, 5-10 minutes/team) part  1 10:30-10:45   coffee break	Centro Carraro – meeting room
12:30-14:00  lunch	Centro Carraro - Restaurant
14:00-14-30  freetime
14:30 – 16:00 Interview and debate with “Tante Tinte” and “Caritas      Verona”  representatives	Centro Carraro – meeting room
16:00-16:30   free time
16:30- 19:00 Working session Nr. 2 ·         Presentation of  the comparative analyses and conclusions drawn by all partners.( 11 presentations, 5-10 minutes/team)   part   2	Centro Carraro – meeting room
19:30       Dinner	Centro Carraro - Restaurant
21:00- 22:00 “Young and  Elders Dancing Together”. Intergenerational Dance Lesson coordinated by the Swedish team.
Fri   9th March 2012 9:00 -12:30    Working session Nr. 3 Starting a new day together : Energizing exercise ·         Elaboration of a questionnaire on generation gap issues. (International group work activity) ·         Methods for its processing and analyzing.   ·         From the grid filled in to a common brochure. ·         Elaboration of a list of tasks for the study visits in Verona  and the neighbourhood area: watching the way of life of young  and old  Italians ( customs, traditions, everyday life) 10:30-10:45   coffee break	Centro Carraro – meeting room
12:30-14:00  lunch	Centro Carraro - Restaurant
14:00-18:30  Visit to  Lazise and Garda Lake. Study visit to  the  village.   Photo session .	Lazise and Lago di Garda
18:30- 20:00   Socializing activities: talks in international groups about the visited places	Centro Carraro- meeting room
19:30 Dinner	Centro Carraro – Restaurant or city
Sat   10th  March 2012 8:30 – 9:00- Meeting of the project coordinators 9:00 – 10:00 – Written evaluation of the meeting from all the 57   participants 10:00- 18:00 – Visits of Verona and Venezia , each participant with the sheet with  tasks to be filled in 19:00-20:00 Final evaluation of the meeting. Awarding  of certificates of participation	Centro Carraro- meeting room Verona   or   Venice
Sun   11th March 2012
Departures

Generation Gap

Psychologist Florentina Carolina Baciu
CJAPP Maramureș
Thoughts on the debate organized on the 4^th of November 2012 by the students of Mihai Eminescu National College from Baia Mare during the Gruntvig Project Reunion Meeting “Youngsters and Elders for a Better Life”.

Location: Mihai Eminescu National College - Baia Mare
Number of attendees: 112
1. Youngsters aged between 16 and 19
2. Project teams from: Hungary, Italy, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom and Romania

I decided that the starting point of this activity should be the values, more specifically the students’ values system versus what they believed constituted their parents’ set of ethical values. I operated on the assumption according to which a real, genuine dispute must be triggered by principles, matters of essence, convictions. Otherwise, the so-called generation gap is solely a caprice or often enough an immature, rarely elegant way of getting attention.  

And so, the attending students were requested to identify a set of 7 values by which they conduct their daily lives. Once identified, the students were required to choose three such values which they considered to be of utmost importance. They were then instructed to do the same while taking under consideration their parents’ perspective. This task caused the students to make an effort to identify, empathize with their parents given that they found themselves in a situation in which they had to imagine/infer their parents’ fundamental values based on their behaviors, ideas and attitudes..

What surprised me….?

…the fact that the students’ fundamental values were beautiful, insightful, mature, meaningful and able to help them survive in crisis situations…

…the fact that the students easily revealed/identified the values their parents lived by (I mean… we did not witness an endless series of “ummm” or “give me another minute to figure this out…”). The students had a natural, coherent well-grounded discourse as if they had had the entire previous day to rehearse the answer to this question (which obviously was not the case).

…the fact that there were determined students, daring enough to come forward and support ideas different from the mainstream.  This was the case of a girl student who confessed that in the tempestuous search of her self-identity as a teenager she was guided, supported and helped by a psychologist.  The adolescents present in the room smiled, made a few sarcastic comments while others explicitly disapproved of such an idea, which was seeing a psychologist. Our young student, with a strength and a tranquility sprung from an inner purity provided arguments justifying her choice and expressed her surprise over the other students’ distrust in the psychologist’s ability to guide them throughout crisis situations. For her, this choice was a beneficial one. She turned out to be ok, got to follow the path that she had wished for herself and the disputes barely existed between her and her parents.   They got much closer to each other and significantly more eager to communicate, “She” – an adult-to-become with “Them” – already adults. The appointments with the psychologist were less and less frequent while at the same time being more insightful. They were all grateful to each other.

…the fact that the high school students were unbelievably comfortable with the English language. Terms, ideas, concepts, accents and intonations – it felt like English was their second mother-tongue, there was no stuttering, no “how do you say in English this….”, the discourse was coherent, very much like in a televised talk-show or debate. They projected such a perfection that it caused me to forget even the basic English I knew, and even more than that, overwhelmed by the elegance of their phrasing and the depth of their ideas, certain instances just went by me as I was telling myself, just like an country person taken for the first time at the zoo to see a giraffe, “this is just unbelievable”. These kids’ performance brought praise to their high-school, project, community and country. Through their thoughts and eyes I saw a different Romania, not the one showed on TV but the one I had missed so dearly.

But what surprised me most was the fact that a significant number of the students’ sets of values were pretty similar to those attributed by them to their parents. Astonishment! (felt deep inside, secretly but nonetheless intensely).  I was thinking to myself: Where is the conflict…? In what corner of the soul, conviction, and attitude should I be looking for it? Then I smiled. If they (parents and children) are heading in the same direction, how come they don’t realize it? I wonder whether the generation gap is nothing but a matter of perspective, approach, vision or strategy?...

I left the meeting with many more questions, a few assumptions and a contagious hope.

I shall only share with you my assumptions. These are enough to enable you to figure the questions out by yourselves and then reveal the hopes…

… Isn’t the gap between generations a rebellious, non-conventional way for me to assert my individuality…?  

… Even though I live by the same values as you, I am impacted differently by the events, love, gratitude, life. Is this a mistake…? What do you do to understand me…? What do I do to understand you…? (an educational and healthy rhetoric).

…Why do I try so hard to separate myself from you when in essence my values are just as yours and vice-versa…? Maybe you should show me more often that you love me and you have faith in in me since the values I believe in are not yet enough to keep me on the right track.

 Tranlated by Ioan Fechete