When we are younger we sometimes forget that we're not the only ones that like to have fun. We often forget that those who find themselves living in a facility such as a nursing home still want to be able to enjoy themselves. If you happen to work in one of these facilities you might discover that a lot of those who live there soon find it difficult to stay young thinking and feeling because they are limited to what they can do or what is offered for them to do. You might consider getting together with the staff and those in charge and offer some of these ideas to help the residents there have more fun.
One thing which is always a nice thing to do and doesn't take much energy to do, and is a lot of fun is having scrapbooking sessions. This is a great way for the elderly to go over a lot of fun memories and put them together in colorful and attractive scrapbooks. This is something good to get volunteers to sit down and do with the seniors. Some may need help with the finer details due to arthritis in their hands and poor eyesight. But they will still enjoy going through all of their old pictures and picking out the ones that they can compile in a book that can be looked at over and over again.
If you think that teens are the only ones that love prom night, you'd be wrong. There is nothing more fun for a lot of seniors than to go back in time and have a mock prom night. You can set up a special room that can be decorated with things that represent the era in which a lot of them went to school and help it look like they are returning to the days of their youth. You can even get nominations for a queen and king of the prom along with other kinds of fun rewards. Maybe there is a particular senior there who has the best sense of humor and they could get voted in as the “Class Clown”. There are a lot of different things that you can come up with to help make the prom more fun.
If you want your seniors to dress in formal wear then you can always go around asking for donations from people for the formal wear so that there will be these items available to them so that they can look and feel the part. Also make sure to find volunteers that can help the ladies get ready for the prom with hair and their accessories. You can have corsages made from paper if you don't want to spend the money on real flowers and make sure that you pick out music that was being played when they were teens. You can also get a volunteer to be a photographer and take prom pictures of the happy couples.
Just because people get old, doesn't mean they don't have some sort of talent, which means another good thing you could do that everyone will enjoy is to put on a talent show. This is not just entertaining for the seniors but also for guests and the staff as well. Have tryouts with the patients and get a variety of acts together from dancing to drama. Let the seniors be creative and showcase the talents they were born with.
You may even consider advertising the event and get people from the community and have them come and enjoy the variety of talent that your nursing home has to offer.
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