LIVING HISTORY LESSONS

It is a meeting with a senior, a witness to important historical events that influenced his life. The essence of the meeting is not to learn about important historical events in the general sense, but to focus on the fate of an individual in an interesting, often tragic situation in the history of the world.

A typical structure of work on a living history lesson is as follows: preparation of a senior biography; developing questions for a senior based on a biography; logistic preparation of the meeting; meeting with the senior; development of the collected material; dissemination of the results of the work.

WHY WE USE THIS METHOD

Before our organization was founded, its future members co-coordinated projects based on this method in cooperation with the Zamojskie Volunteer Service association. After establishing HEureka Generator, we took over the responsibility of continuing the international youth projects in the series 'Let me tell you a story...', thanks to which earlier publications were created as a result of 'living history lessons' with Children of the Zamość region, former prisoners of transit and concentration camps, or Polish partisans. We have also created a long-term implementation plan for the method on a local basis.

What are we doing this for? There are few opportunities for joint meetings of seniors with young people. Even if everything around us is changing for the better and these two groups receive support from different sides, there is a lack of various forms of cooperation where both sides can learn from each other and exchange experiences.

The method itself provides the viewer with the history of the 20th century from the perspective of an individual, a person who lived at that time. We have as many shades of one story as many people and places associated with it. Thanks to the 'living history lesson' we show the influence of historical events on the life of an ordinary person and broaden the perspective of looking at the historical events themselves. When organizing a lesson, we do not persuade anyone to accept one specific version of the history, but only listen to the story and take it into account when forming own opinions.

Thanks to such activities, seniors in our local communities strengthen the sense of being a very valuable component of society, from which we can learn a lot. Component which is often damaged by the 'cult of youth' in our times. Young people gain a structural opportunity to contact the representatives of previous generations, contact they could not have before because of lack of tools and methods.

Let us remember that no one lives forever, and the memories of witnesses of important historical events of the turbulent previous century are priceless.