Forum Discussion

Hi, Becky. What I did in the past was organize a movie or Armchair Travel and ask a nurse to put it on at a certain time. I also requested volunteers among the residents’ relatives and in the community to drop in for an hour or two to play a table game with a group of residents. If you have a high function client he/she could conduct a quiz/sing-along for a group of people. Failing that a nurse or kitchen staff may find 10 minutes to do it. I do hope you have cooperative staff.

Hi Becky, I agree with Solange asking a staff member or aid to step in when your gone is a great way to get staff engaged. I always left trivia books, movies, table games, etc. at the Nurses Station!

Look at your recreation assessments and consider what items you can leave out unsupervised safely. If they like board games, card games, then that is what you could leave out. A surveyor will want to see that there is accessibility to items of interest. I have out a large connect four game, large checkers rug and checkers, movies, word search and other puzzles, playing cards, dominoes, jigsaw puzzles, adult coloring supplies.
on our dementia care unit we have fewer items out, but the staff have the key to the activity cupboards to get supplies at any time of day.

What I do is ask for help from some of my high functioning residents.

Do you have residents that are very familiar with a game, that they could run on their own? For example, I have two residents that always play Bunco, they know all the rules and point system, and they have started playing on their own after dinner, led by one of two residents. Sometimes I ask them to run a Bunco game if I won’t be in or need help filling a hole.

Another resource is our musically talented residents. We have some residents that won’t mind playing the piano, leading a sing along or playing some other type of instrument.

Some residents also will lead trivia groups. We either give them a list of printed “finish the phrase” type trivia, or memory magic flash cards.

Calling on family members with talent is also helpful, not only to fill holes, but also for general programming!

Using travel videos, classic tv comedy shows (have a comedy hour), or exercise videos like Thai chi are also good ways to help.