This lesson encourages the children to look at who needs care and who gives care in our community. The lesson presents opportunities to begin to explore the reciprocity of caring, which is further developed at fifth and sixth class.
The overall aim of the theme Cúram agus roinnt is to enable the child to:
The objectives of this lesson are to enable the child to:
For Activity 3 in this lesson, the children will need to write down answers to a quiz, in groups or individually. For Activity 4 in this lesson, you may choose to distribute a printed copy of Tá Éilís ina cónaí ina h-aonar to the class. In the Online activities, Things to do, Activity 2 suggests inviting an older person into the classroom as an informant on local history, using oral evidence as recommended in the History curriculum. In the Online activities, Things to do, Activity 1 and Activity 4 suggest two projects - you may decide to focus on one or have different groups in the class undertake different projects.
The activities in this lesson use the following words: oibrí cúraim/oibrithe cúraim, daoine aosta a bhfuil cúram de dhíth orthu, grúpaí deonacha, an Rialtas, an phróiseálaí focal, tionscnamh, Láithreán Gréasáin.
| Lesson plan | Discussion Brainstorm Quiz Scéal |
Who needs care? Can all older people take care of themselves? How much care? Tá Éilís ina cónaí ina h-aonar |
| Online activities | Pop-up facts | Caring for older people |
Multiple choice Cloze procedure Mathematics |
Who cares? Older people help us Grandad and Colm go to the cinema |
|
Project Classroom visitor Creative writing Project |
Voluntary groups in my area Learning from older people Tom lives next door Hobbies now and long ago |
Elicit from the children that everyone needs care at different points of their lives. The following questions may be helpful:
Some points for discussion include:
Encourage the children to explore how much care older people need. The following questions may be helpful:
Use the blackboard to track the children's answers and allow the discussion to continue, encouraging the children to talk about their own experiences with older people. In any class, children are likely to know a mixture of active, independent older people and more dependent older people. Use the following information to ensure that the children are aware that although some older people need care, most do not need care:
Discuss also with the children the benefits of caring - the feel good factor, the development of a relationship with an older person, perhaps a parent. Encourage any discussion that may arise around that fact that parents care for children and in turn, children care for their parents in old age - this is the reciprocity of caring. Many of those currently being looked after cared for their carers as children.
This activity explores the varying levels of care that older people need, developing further on some of the information discussed in Activity 2 in this lesson. You can organise this quiz as an individual quiz or on a team basis. Ask the pupils to write their answers on a piece of paper. Choose some or all of the following questions, depending on your class:
Supply the correct answers to the pupils. Allow them some time to think about and discuss the answers, exploring why they may have chosen a wrong answer, what influenced their attitudes. Ask the children if they were surprised by some of the answers. If they were surprised, discuss what aspects surprised them.
Here is some background information that may be helpful:
Léigh an scéal Tá Éilís ina cónaí ina h-aonar don rang.
Discuss Alice's case, using some questions:
Listen to all the suggestions and write some of them on the board. Suggestions may include: home help, regular visits from a neighbour, visits from the public health nurse, use of a day care centre, use of meals-on-wheels, installing a personal alarm system - see the possible happy ending below for more suggestions.
Depending on your class, ask each pupil to write their own ending to Alice’s story. Invite a number to read out their ending. Here is a possible happy ending:
The staff in the local health centre listen to what Alice would prefer. Emer and Alice are invited to the meeting. This is what they decide. Emer agrees to come down twice a week to see her mother and some of her grandchildren agree to take turns to sleep over in Alice’s house one night a week. A neighbour agrees to drive Alice to the church once a week and to look in quite often. With Alice’s agreement, she has a key to the house and she has Emer’s mobile phone number in case there is any problem.
The local public health nurse, who visits people at home, adds Alice to her list of patients. From now on, she too will call regularly, will help Alice to bathe herself and generally keep in touch. The nurse will call the doctor if she is worried about Alice’s health.
Alice is also happy to be visited by a member of the home help service, who will now call several times a week, to do the ironing, the hoovering, the shopping and other little jobs that need to be done.
Alice is also told that she can have a hot, cooked lunch delivered by the local meals-on-wheels service. She is not sure that she wants this, so it is decided to begin it on a trial basis and see how it goes.
You could point out the way Alice’s wishes were considered and how the solution is a combination of family, friends and professional involvement. You may wish to expand the discussion on the role of the public health nurse, the concept of a home help and of meals-on-wheels. If you have already discussed the reciprocity of caring, refer to Emer's role in this story.
This lesson provides opportunities for many cross-curricular activities and links directly to the curriculum for primary schools as follows:
| SPHE | Myself and the wider world | Developing citizenship |
| History | Local studies | Games
and pastimes in the past Buildings, sites or ruins in my locality |
The key questions for this lesson include: