The importance of community for reducing social isolation

Suitable for 14-19-year olds (secondary and high schools, and college), this article and accompanying activity sheet can be used in the classroom and at home.

This resource links to KS4 and KS5 anthropology, social science and citizenship.

It can also be used as a careers resource and links to Gatsby Benchmarks:
Gatsby Benchmark 2: Learning from career and labour market information
Gatsby Benchmark 4: Linking curriculum learning to careers

• This teaching resource explains the work of Dr Janet Page-Reeves, a cultural anthropologist at the University of New Mexico, and her team. They have established Tertulias, peer support groups for Mexican immigrant women, and are investigating whether these Tertulias groups can reduce social isolation and depression.

• This resource also contains interviews with team members and offers an insight into careers in anthropology. If your students have questions for the team, they can send them to them online. All they need to do is to go to the article online (see the Futurum link below), scroll down to the end and type in the question(s). The team will will reply!

• The activity sheet provides ‘talking points’ (based on Bloom’s Taxonomy) to prompt students to reflect on the team’s research and challenges them to design a peer support group to reduce social isolation among the elderly.

• The article and activity sheet are also available in Spanish through the weblink below.

This resource was first published on Futurum Careers, a free online resource and magazine aimed at encouraging 14-19-year-olds worldwide to pursue careers in science, tech, engineering, maths, medicine (STEM) and social sciences, humanities and the arts for people and the economy (SHAPE).

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