Dutch Retirement Home

1. How easy is it to find accommodation for young people in your region/country?

2. Is there an age gap between young and old in your country?

3. Is there a shortage of senior-care provision where you live?

4. What attitudes towards ageing do people in your country have? What attitudes do people in the UK have, do you think?

Read article here: Dutch Retirement Home Reading

5. Would students/senior citizens in your country be happy to go along with the ideas mentioned in the article?

6. Do you see any possible problems coming from this arrangement?

7. Is this a great idea or a symbol of western society's failure to look after its old?

8. Would you like/have liked to spend your university years living in a retirement home?

9. Would you like to live in a home like this when you retire?

10. Should universities and the senior-care sector come together to replicate this project in other areas?

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Situation 1

Your teacher is a first-year student at Moscow University looking for affordable accommodation. You work in the student welfare dept. Persuade him of the benefits for this type of accommodation.

Situation 2

You are the care-home manager. Inform your teacher of the rules and regulations that he needs to obey as a student/carer.

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Discuss quotes

"I'm kind of comfortable with getting older because it's better than the other option, which is being dead. So I'll take getting older."   

--- George Clooney                                                                                                                 

"The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm."

--- Aldous Huxley

"The age of a woman doesn't mean a thing. The best tunes are played on the oldest fiddles."

--- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Just remember, once you're over the hill you begin to pick up speed."

--- Arthur Schopenhauer

Student Handout: Dutch Retirement

Noisy Neighbours

1. Do you live in a quiet neighbourhood? In what way is your neighbourhood different from others?

2. How much has it changed over the years? What things have changed for the better and what for the worse?

3. Do you get on with your neighbours? If you had a problem with them, who could you approach? If you report an incident of noisy behaviour, do your local police react to it?

4. Which of the following facilities would you object to being built in your neighbourhood? Order them from most to least acceptable. Why would you object to the ones you dislike most?

a new motorway

a casino

an airport

a landfill (rubbish dump, garbage dump)

a prison

a primary school

a homeless shelter

student accommodation

a centre for the treatment of drug addiction

a mosque, a synagogue or a church

a centre for teenage youths with problems

5. Are you a NIMBY? (NIMBY is the acronym for Not In My Back Yard). It describes someone who is against any kind of development in their neighbourhood. Do you have such groups in your country?

Read article here: Noisy Neighbours Reading

6. What is your reaction? 

7. If you lived in that area of Bristol, what would you do? Tell me about soundproofing, moving to a different area, appealing to the university authorities, starting a campaign on social media etc.

8. Are you surprised that Bristol universities are paying the police to patrol areas where students live?

9. Do you see a connection between bad student behaviour and private accommodation? Do you see a connection between the students' social class and their behaviour?

10. Do cities in your country have districts that are mainly for students? Who offers them accommodation - is it universities, or do private landlords provide it?

11. Do students in your country party like their UK counterparts, or are they more serious about their studies? Is this a generational problem - are the young less respectful of social norms?

12. Did your university provide a 'Guide to Community Living'? Did you read it? What guidelines were included? Did it include advice on 'hiring DJs, sound equipment and door staff'?

13. What do you understand about 'pre-loading' (paragraph 9) for party-goers? Does this play a role in bad behaviour? What measures could counter this?

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Situation

You have been appointed head of student services at Bristol University. You've called a press conference to announce new measures against late-night noise, and you're updating the 'Guide to Community Living'. Answer any questions from the awaiting journalists (your teacher).

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Discuss quotes

“No man should live where he can hear his neighbour's dog bark.”

― Nathaniel Macon

“In my Paris apartment, when a neighbour drives nails into the wall at an undue hour, I "naturalise" the noise by imagining that I am in my house in Dijon, where I have a garden. And finding everything I hear quite natural, I say to myself: "That's my woodpecker at work in the acacia tree." This is my method for obtaining calm when things disturb me.”

― Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space

“People don't want to listen to their thoughts, so they fill the world with noise.”

― Erin Entrada Kelly, Hello, Universe

“Every song may be someone else's personal implement of torture.”

― Francine Prose, Goldengrove

Student Handout PDF: Noisy Neighbours

Farming

1. Rank these activities. Put the best things about

being a farmer at the top:

• Animals

• Growing things

• Driving a tractor

• Having no boss

• Healthy lifestyle

• Beautiful views

• Being on the land

• Animals

• Money

2. How important is farming in your country? Who does it? Is it principally the older generation which farms? At what age do they retire? Does your government do anything to encourage young people to become farmers?

3. Have you had any experience of farming yourself? Would you like to? Does the idea of growing your own food appeal to you? Do you have 'green fingers'? Have you ever been tempted to quit the 'rat race' and become self-sufficient?

4. At what age would you like to retire? Does the state pension provide enough money for a comfortable retirement? What do you think of the UK government's plan (see article) to give retiring farmers this large amount of money? Does it make sense? Do you think that there is a younger generation that can't wait to become farmers?

Read article here: Farming Reading

5. The UK government believes that older farmers are 'stuck in their ways' and that they are resistant to change: is that true in your country? Are young farmers in your country more open to greener farming methods?

6. Should there be an incentive for young people to become farmers as well? If all the old farmers retire, how can the government be sure that there will be another generation to replace them?

7. Could the principle of paying older people to retire early be applied to other industries? Which ones? Is there, on the other hand, an argument for paying older people to not retire early? Are there any sectors where experience is more important than youth?

8. Most farmers become farmers because their families have always farmed. Isn't this family-based system better than having the government intervene in the market?

9. Do you know any old people that are more environmentally friendly than their younger counterparts?

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Situation

It is May, 2019. You are a senior government advisor. One year ago, the government asked you to make UK farming greener. After a lot of research, you have decided on the scheme of paying older farmers to retire early. You are now meeting the Prime Minister (your teacher) to announce your plans. Answer any questions he has.

..........

Discuss quotes

“A farmer is a magician who produces money from the mud.”

― Amit Kalantri

“There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the supermarket, and the other that heat comes from the furnace.”

― Aldo Leopold

"To resist change, to try to cling to life, is therefore like holding your breath: if you persist, you kill yourself."

--- Alan Watts

"Every generation needs a new revolution."

--- Thomas Jefferson

“The young, no doubt, make mistakes; but the old, when they try to think for them, make even greater mistakes.”

― Bertrand Russell

Student Handout PDF: Farming

Photo: Nicolas Veithen

Dancing Grannies

 1. What type of people and groups have you noticed using your local public park?

2. Which kinds of official or unofficial events and gatherings take place there?

3.How are people expected to behave there? Are there any rules or regulations about using the park or public space?

4. Is anti-social behaviour a problem in your local parks? How does it manifest itself? Is a particular group responsible for it? Can you think of any possible solutions to this behaviour? 

5. Have you ever been called a 'spoilsport'? Have you ever 'pulled the plug' on someone's party/celebration or activity?

Read article here: Dancing Grannies 

6. What surprised you the most - China having noisy, dancing 'grannies' early in the morning, or the hostility shown towards them?

7. Taking exercise early in the morning seems to be a relatively harmless way of improving people's health and improving social cohesion - isn't the disruption it causes relatively minimal? Don't the benefits outweigh the costs? Speaking as a citizen of a country where hardly anyone exercises, I might even welcome the arrival of dancing grannies - I could look forward to fewer people seeking healthcare and having groups of citizens who invest themselves into their communities - what say you?

8. Given the choice, who would you prefer to confront - a gang of skinheads, or a group of middle-aged ladies exercising to music?

9. What is the traditional idea of the attitude of young Chinese people towards older generations? Does this attitude exist in other societies too? How does the article show a different reality to what we might expect?

10. In what other situations might young people be annoyed by the behaviour of older people, and vice versa?

11. Is there an all-female social group of a similar type in your country? Do they have a particular behaviour that makes them stand out from the rest of society?

12. Would you ever consider buying the speaker-disabling device? When would you use it? Does it really bring 'social justice'?

13. "Everything is based on social maintenance: the larger number of people matters." Is this true of all societies? Do the authorities always favour the majority in areas where legislation is not clear?

14. If you were the mayor of a Chinese city, what solutions would you propose to mitigate the problem?

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Situation: choose A or B

A: You are a twenty-year-old shift worker who lives in an apartment overlooking a public park. You moved to the apartment as you wanted to live in a nice quiet area next to the park. Your work demands that you work irregular hours, and you often arrive home at six am and go straight to bed. Your sleep has often been interrupted recently by a group of senior citizens who hold an early-morning dance class. It is making you miserable. You feel that something should be done to prevent these kinds of noisy events. Speak to one of these senior citizens and make your feelings known. The park doesn’t belong to them.

B: You are in your 70s or 80s. You have joined a ballroom-dancing group that meets in the park three times a week. Being part of the group has not only made you fitter, it has enabled you to make friends and you no longer feel lonely. You don’t understand why young people can’t respect that.

..........

Discuss quotes

"Noise is the most impertinent of all forms of interruption. It is not only an interruption, but also a disruption of thought."

--- Arthur Schopenhauer

"We like no noise unless we make it ourselves."

--- Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, marquise de Sevigne

"Noise pollution is a relative thing. In a city, it's a jet plane taking off. In a monastery, it's a pen that scratches."

--- Robert Orben

"There was no respect for youth when I was young. And now that I am old, there is no respect for age - I missed it coming and going."

--- JB Priestly

"Nothing makes you more tolerant of a neighbour's noisy party than being there."

--- Franklin P. Jones

“The one who lives with neighbours and relatives will learn to live with the gain of pains and the pain of gains”

― P.S. Jagadeesh Kumar

Student Handout PDF: Dancing Grannies

Photo: Max Chen