Danish students gift nursing home residents a 50-year history in audio

A group of 12- and 13-year-old students in Vejle has created an audio timeline of the past 50 years as a gift for the 56 blind residents of Solgaven nursing home, marking the facility’s half-century anniversary, Danish broadcaster DR reports.

The seventh-grade class from Novaskolen spent weeks compiling historical events—from the founding of Apple to Queen Margrethe’s abdication—alongside personal stories from their visits to the home. Each entry on the timeline is paired with a QR code that, when scanned, plays a recording of the students describing the event or memory.

Resident Birgit Kosack, who has participated in the school’s visits for seven years, called the project “a breath of fresh air.” “I don’t know how much they get out of it,” she said, “but we get so much from talking to them. It’s wonderful that young people take an interest in how we old folks live.”

The collaboration began in 2019, with students visiting the home at least twice a year to interview residents about topics ranging from first loves to favorite meals. Mogens Mortensen, 79, said the exchanges give the students perspective: “They’re astonished when they hear we didn’t have computers or mobile phones. It’s a completely different world from theirs.”

The audio timeline will remain at Solgaven as a permanent resource for residents, who are all blind or severely visually impaired.