Can a family recipe tell the story of an entire generation? Can it bring back memories of Greece, revive moments shared around the family table and connect grandchildren with their grandparents’ experiences?

With these questions in mind, the Greek Community of Melbourne (GCM) Schools are once again taking part in Get Online Week 2026, an initiative run by the Good Things Foundation to promote digital inclusion and help people develop digital skills, particularly those facing barriers to accessing and using technology.

As part of the campaign, the schools have launched a special educational project titled ‘One Recipe, One Story – Flavours Passed Down Through Generations’, combining Greek language learning, family history, intergenerational connections and digital creativity.

The project was initiated by Christina Soumi, Assistant Principal of the Greek Community of Melbourne Schools, who developed the idea and is overseeing its planning, coordination and implementation.

At its heart are grandparents, who are invited to share not only a treasured family recipe with their grandchildren but also the stories and memories behind it.

Where possible, grandparents visit classrooms to introduce their recipes and talk about their childhoods, their places of origin in Greece and the family traditions they have carried with them. Students take on the role of young researchers, asking who passed down each recipe, when it was traditionally prepared, what memories are associated with it and how these traditions continue in Australia today.

And whenever circumstances allow, the classroom becomes a little kitchen. Grandparents take on the role of head chefs, while children become their enthusiastic assistants, learning the secrets of family recipes through hands-on experience.

But the project goes well beyond preparing traditional dishes. Older students record the recipes and the stories behind them in digital formats, while younger children contribute drawings and artwork. The material will be brought together in a digital cookbook of family recipes and stories, creating a collection of flavours, memories and traditions from Melbourne’s Greek community.

In this way, recipes traditionally passed down orally from one generation to the next will find a permanent place in a digital collection, preserving small but meaningful pieces of family and community history that might otherwise be lost.

The project also encourages students to explore their family roots by recording, with participants’ consent, details about their grandparents, including their names, dates of birth and places of origin. Through these personal accounts, students will discover how individual family journeys contribute to the wider history of Greek migration and the Greek community in Melbourne.

Importantly, learning goes both ways. While grandparents share their knowledge, experiences and family traditions, students have the opportunity to help them use digital technology. Working together, older family members can build confidence in creating digital documents, taking photographs, recording stories and saving family memories, discovering new ways to preserve and share their experiences.

Christina Soumi, Assistant Principal and Project Coordinator, said:

“We want children to understand that the Greek language is not something found only in textbooks. It lives in our family stories, memories and traditions passed down from one generation to the next. Through this project, students become the storytellers and guardians of their family’s cultural heritage.

At the same time, it gives us a wonderful opportunity to reverse the roles: grandparents teach children their treasured recipes, while children show their grandparents how technology can help preserve and share these precious stories.”

The initiative highlights the role of schools not only as places where children learn the Greek language, but also as meeting points for generations, where experiences are shared, family connections are strengthened and cultural identity is celebrated.

At the same time, the project supports the goals of Get Online Week by giving digital technology a meaningful and creative purpose. Digital learning becomes a shared experience, encouraging collaboration between children and older family members while helping to bridge the digital divide between generations.

Because behind every recipe there is a story – and every story shared creates another connection between the past, present and future of the community.