Most Mondays at lunchtime, Townshend Adult Activity program participants and Stratton House Nursing Home residents meet at the dinner table but are mindful to leave room for their special guests.

At the same time, young volunteers walk across the common from the Townshend Elementary School and greet their favorite seniors with a smile and book to read aloud to their elders. For the next 20 minutes, about 25 elders and 30 children share their company, lunch time, and lives with the seniors who usually have little contact with young people.

This four-year-old partnership of old and young is the Elder Project, an inter-generational initiative of the Townshend Elementary School's Community Service Club and the Otis Health Care Center.

"Conversation was difficult for the children at first," says Lorraine Gleason, Stratton House Activities Therapist. "The really old were taught not to talk at the dinner table. They've really come a long way, and now the children are able to bring some of the residents out so that they will talk."

"The children get to see that a nursing home is not a gloomy place where people sit in chairs and stare out the window. The short visits by the children do wonders for the elders. It really perks them up. I see our residents as feeling more needed, with more of a connection to the community.The kids talk about their pets, their Halloween costumes, and more. Some kids are really shy and wait for the older person to start a conversation. The Stratton Home residents are invited to attend programs by the students at the elementary school and the seniors have gone to concerts, plays, and puppet shows. We always have a good time when we're together."

The seeds of community service continue to grow as the children grow -- students who started as part of the elementary school program are now middle school volunteers at Stratton House and the Adult Day Care program.