Last week we shared with you a video from Skills for Care, delivered in partnership with NAPA, that looks at why meaningful activities are so important especially during a pandemic and how organisations and services can continue to motivate and engage their whole staff teams to be involved in activity provision. We also shared with you a list of virtual activity ideas that you could implement in your services.

This week we wanted to share with you some more activities that Skills for Care, in partnership with NAPA, have pulled together that are more practical. We have also included the video again as a refresher which shares lots of useful top tips on meaningful engagement from other Social Care organisations from a variety of different services.

Click here to watch the video, and to download a list of activity ideas you can implement into your service.

https://vimeo.com/508089292

Practical Activity Ideas:

Exercise –

• Any type of exercise – yoga, tai chi, noodles, scarf, stretchy band exercise
• Doorway football
• Cricket in the garden
• Seated chair exercises including chair yoga.
• Inside golf – putting or crazy golf
• Exercise with balloon batting
• Dancing sessions / Music with fitness
• Parkside Olympics
• Running
• Interactive boxing
• Ping pong

Craft –

• Spiral notebooks / colouring pencils / watercolours paints
• Notice board for signs to connect with loved ones
• Adult appropriate colouring
• Craft supplies and kits
• Word search and crosswords
• Wool o trivia books
• Stationary / pens for pen pals
• Small pots of flowers
• Assisting a resident to create 12 different artworks to form a 2021 calendar for themselves
• Organising art competitions.
• Making cushions out of loved one’s clothes
• Crocheting and knitting
• Soap making
• Making scrapbooks
• Mandalas
• Going into the garden, gardening club, and enjoying the outside.

Indoor –

• Joke Hour – everyone takes turns telling prepared and printed jokes
• Bread machine for aroma and then snacking
• Singing between staff and residents
• Hallway choir
• Doorway bingo/Themed Quiz Bingo / Picture Bingo
• Decks of cards
• Large print books
• Hand-held video games o magazines / newspapers
• Aroma therapy / essential oils and diffusers
• Choir / Sing and Sign sessions for Makaton signing
• Printing out old maps and taking a walk- through history with residents
• Ascot day
• Local history documentaries
• Sorting wardrobes / Fashion Show with life story
• Create a pub, a social distance café, shop
• Chutney making / Bake Off competition
• Subscribed to a Snack Box company who provide treats from different places of the world
• The life history work
• Reading, discussing and playing music

We want to let you know that we are here to support you, and if you would like any more information on the above or to discuss how else we can support your service, please let us know. To get in touch, my contact details are 03305 552233 and my email address is [email protected]

As a specialist, family run recruitment business, we provide a proactive and consultative approach to recruitment. We help organisations to target issues such as continuity of staffing, reducing spend where you have a high volume of agency usage and supporting those who have specific talent requirements or are in hard to fill locations. We can help with any immediate staffing requirements or longer-term recruitment projects to ultimately save you time and money on agency spend.

Click here to see what our clients say about how we have supported them throughout the pandemic.