Forum Discussion

That's a awesome idea... i do the same every Friday morning and we do a crossword. .nothing serious and the residents love it.. good luck with it hun

I have a morning coffee and news session. We drink coffee/hot tea and chat about the news. I suggest having donuts to offer as well. I offer donuts on Friday's. It seems like if there is a type of snack offered I have a better turn out. Some days are slower then others. That is when we do crossword puzzles or word searches. My residents also love Sudoku. Hope this helps you a bit.

The home I work in is somewhat limited and a good third are on bed rest, the ones we do have up and about like to have a coffee afternoon Tuesday and Thursday. In that time we tend to lean towards a sing along. Since doing this we have got the residents to converse with each other. They whip out the sweets offer them around and they remember how the music made them feel back in the day. From Frank Sinatra, Vera Lynn even the beatles.

Hi Ema, that’s what it is all about: making them feel comfortable, content, at home, and ‘normal’. Well done! Thank you for sharing.

We do coffee and news every weekday. I have the newspaper to look over and we talk about the headlines. We also do crossword puzzles and just chat. I offer donuts on Friday (which brings a larger crowd). It is a great way to start their day off with conversation and coffee with others.

These are fantastic ideas!
Depending on your crowd, you could also show them photographs of current events or nature. Some news websites have sections called "The Week in Photos" or "Award-winning Pet Photos" or things like that, and I've used these with success. First we guess where/when the photo was taken, then we read the caption and look up the location, then we comment on the photo, then we reminisce about similar experiences in our own lives. For example, I used a photo of a mountain climber recently. We looked up the South American Mountain where the photo was taken, we talked about what the climber was feeling and experiencing, and then we talked about our own hiking/cliimbing experiences (if any). We usually get through about 10-15 pictures in about 30 minutes.

Does anyone have a particular site that they get the news from. Most news is negative or very political that I would not want to use with our participants. It does look like USA today newspapers online looks pretty good. Any other ideas would be great.

Hi Val
You are right most of the news is negative or political or both
You can use this day in history for each month for example for April use this link
https://www.goldencarers.com/this-day-in-history-for-seniors-april/5414/
Each month has one

Thanks for all your suggestions.