Michael

sooooo happy and thankful I have this medium as saves so much time and energy collecting info and collating it , thank you everyone for all your ideas it covers sooo much
Cathy xx

Great thanks , for all your hard work x

It is a great resource with fantastic ideas to try out and to share. The time it saves with all research for ideas is invaluable, I highly recommend being a member and register, its also a platform to share ideas of activities tried and tested ( however i'm not so talented) which makes this being a member more invaluable , thanks to all for sharing x

Thank you for your replies , I think sometimes I am to hard on myself as well but I really want to make my job work . I do think I need to learn about the different stages of dementia and specific activities for these residents x

Just wondering how many residents everyone has and how many have full capacity ? I have 6 residents from 45 that have full capacity I feel all my group activities are always the same 6 . I do spend a lot of time with one to one's as well but feel a lot of the other workers think I favour these residents over the other when obviously that is not the case .

Thank you for all your replies and encouragement . I have to say that there is maybe a handful at the most who are mobile enough to walk to an activity , the staff are ran off their feet and do very little in the way of motivating the residents . I have often walked in and found them all sleeping and tried to motivate them myself I always manage a one to one with these residents but never a group activity . There is one group of 4 that I can engage with for a quiz or crafts and a conversation , but I honestly can say that all of the other residents benefit more from a one to one rather than group structured activities and this is purely down to their level of needs . I love doing one to ones as I feel I can totally engage with the person and really have some meaningful time with them , it's just really difficult to justify my job at times but I am new to this and I won't be giving up .

At work today I was talking with one of the senior carers about my job, she said she would't do my job as she thinks it would be really difficult as this is more of a nursing home than a residential home . I asked her what she meant and she said that most residents here don't have much capacity and are mostly dementia and aren't capable of taking part in activities .

I do agree that this is the case with the residents but surely these people still need motivation and one to one attention ? I just feel a little deflated today , sorry I don't mean to rant .

We have 3 units with 15 residents in each unit , the units have mixed capacity . I was wondering if anyone can tell me if it's normal to have only a few residents each day that are interested in taking part ?
I find one to one a lot better as you really get to engage with the person and it is always a success but when it comes to group activity there isn't a lot of interest. My manager has asked me to make a folder for each resident to show person centred activities but I am finding it hard to gather much information and without sounding horrible reading their biography they didn't have hobbies or really any interests I was actually shocked by this .
My manager would like to see the residents continue with their interests but I can't seem to find out much or there is no record .

Hi everyone I thought I should introduce myself. My name is Michelle I have been an activity coordinator for 7 weeks now , I am from Scotland and work in a care home with 45 residents with mixed needs . Looking forward to learning lots of new activities and more of an insight into my role .