Kellbell68 0 Report Share Posted January 27, 2008 Hi Everyone! My Administrator has asked me to start having a group activity every day right before lunch. We have 2 lunch seatings. The first group are the dependent diners, and the second group are the residents who need minimal help. They tend to sit outside of the dining room for 30-45 minutes before they can go into lunch... and they are all congregating in the front lobby... it just doesn't look good. I am at a loss what to do for them at this time. A lot of them love the Price is Right, which is always on in the lobby, so I don't want to do a sing-a-long or something like that, because we have a few residents who aren't too happy when they can't hear their 'program' Any suggestions for this pre-lunch activity would be greatly appreciated. Kelly:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OceanGuy23 2 Report Share Posted January 27, 2008 Hi Kelley Is there an area away from the lounge to not disturb those residents who are watching the Price is Right where you could get a group of residents together and do balloon toss or hangman or even read a couple of short stories from the Chicken Soup for the Soul books. Good luck and im sure you will come up with something great. Kevin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imzoop 0 Report Share Posted January 27, 2008 Hi Kelly, My department has found that the time just before breakfast, lunch, and dinner, can be the most rewarding activity time frames for some of our residents. We do 1:1 activities in a group setting. We alternately call this time Do Drop In or Puzzles'N'Things. Our main focus is on those residents who are not up between meals for group activitities, our lower functioning residents that need a more hands on activity intervention, and those who may be higher functioning with special needs that we can assist during this time frame. We may play music or put a respite video on the television. While two or three may be interacting with the respite video, we set one or two residents up with person appropriate - cognitively stimulating puzzles, then we move to the next resident(s) and perhaps begin a senory stimulation activity, or lotion rub. We may give a resident a small stack of wash clothes to fold, or items to sort. Then we return to those working on their puzzles and assist or set them up with new ones to work on. Then return to another resident or two and get them sorting, drawing, coloring, or perhaps working on another activity that is more appropriate for them. We have women's purses and items that one might find in a purse. We set the items down and ask a reisdent to put the items in the purse. (We have found that they will not touch an already filled purse, because it isn't polite to get into someone elses purse.) Most of these residents have a short attention span and the time frame we have to work with them here is perfect. We may work with 3 residents or 10 residents during one activity session. We keep in mind that we want to provide for each resident that we work with, an activity that they will have the best response to, and that will bring them the most benefit. This activity has cut our independent programming (room visits) down by at least 2/3rds. These residents are at their most rested and alert time of day, and are up rather than laying in bed. When we do this just before breakfast we find that our higher functioning residents want to participate and like being given newspapers, coffee, & magazines. We do a little cueing and the current events discussions, reminiscing, and social interaction takes on a life of it's own. I am looking forward to hearing what other Activity Departments are doing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bamdill65 0 Report Share Posted January 29, 2008 Hi, I have the same situation. We started doing sing-alongs, guess the scent game, which is using didferent aromatherapy oils, only 2or 3 kinds ,put on cotton balls,go table to table and have the residents smell them and guess what kind it is.if you use food smells,that can be a stimulant .-Bambi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mogreen 0 Report Share Posted January 30, 2008 Hi, I have the same situation. We started doing sing-alongs, guess the scent game, which is using didferent aromatherapy oils, only 2or 3 kinds ,put on cotton balls,go table to table and have the residents smell them and guess what kind it is.if you use food smells,that can be a stimulant .-Bambi Hi, can you have your morning program last a little longer or make your own price is right game have items that you have brought from the store and see if the residents can guess the price and them could win a prize or ribbon depending on your budget. Please let us know how it works out. Can you mention what pre meal programs you provide before breakfest and dinner. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gilbertsgirl 0 Report Share Posted January 30, 2008 Hi Kelly, We have a fireplace so we have fireside act. it ranges from trivia, reminisce. jokes, sing-a-long. Then we go right in to the lunch time meal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spunkybee 0 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 Ok - i have a few suggestions. Depending upon the age and type of residents you have you could do an impromptu trivia q & a game. (there are several books and stuff/trivia found online.) make it a contest of sorts and reward them. Do charades - make them laugh and that could make them hungry. Reminiscing is always good. I do a friday evening activity that i do with 5 dice called "high 5". You take a box with you, each resident only gets one turn with 5 rolls per person. The goal is to roll all 6's in 5 turns. It can be done. keep a score board like a wipe on board and write the scores down per person and make it fun. As the person rolls a "6" - remove that die. At the end of 5 rolls, add up their scores. It is a great way to kill time. Good luck finding something!! spunkybee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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