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Patterns of volunteering over the life cycle
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Article: Patterns of volunteering over the life cycle (PDF)
Objective
- To explore the importance of volunteering both for the individual and for society.
Method
- Conduct a survey to find out how many students in the class have done volunteer work. Ask them to briefly describe where they were working and what their volunteer job entailed.
- Have students talk about their parents' and possibly their grandparents' involvement in volunteering. Each generation may have different reasons for offering their time as volunteers. Can you see a pattern to who volunteers and why?
- Relying on their own experience, ask students to list some of the benefits and some of the drawbacks of volunteering.
- According to the article, there is an association between volunteering and being socially connected. How has volunteering expanded your range of interactions with people? Were most of these interactions proximate or extended? Explain.
- Describe in your own words why you think volunteering is important to society. Consider what would happen if all volunteers quit their job tomorrow.
Using other resources
- Caring Canadians, involved Canadians: Highlights from the 1997 National Survey of Giving, Volunteering and Participating. Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 71-542-XPE. Available also on the Internet.
Please e-mail comments or examples of how you used this exercise in your class.
