Residents at Beech Lodge Care & Nursing Home in Holbeach enjoyed a month of ‘Back to school’ themed activities throughout September. Care and Nursing Homes across the Country Court group were encouraged to use residents’ ideas and memories of school days to create fun and engaging activities.
The ‘back to school’ activities had a different weekly theme throughout the month, with prizes for the most engaging activity each week. In week one, the challenge was to learn a language, week two was poetry week and week three was science week. For the final week, the care homes held a school theme day, staff dressed up and residents enjoyed fun lessons and activities. Residents enjoyed school dinner themed menus for lunch with sponge pudding and custard for dessert to make it fully authentic.
Staff and residents at Beech Lodge were delighted to be recognised as overall winners of the Back-to-school themed activities. Their month of activities started with reminiscing about school days with lots of stories about school life during the war, carrying gas masks to school, going home for lunch and getting their third of a pint of milk a day. They had fun learning some Spanish words and phrases in their language class including colours, fruits and basic words. During poetry week residents made up poems about their names and had lots of laughs brainstorming rhyming words. They even wrote a fantastic poem celebrating life at Beech Lodge:
Beech Lodge has become our home, a safe place we feel free to roam.
We have found love and friendship in this homely place, taking comfort in a friendly face.
Having a sing-along is always our first choice, it’s nice to feel we still have a voice.
Whether playing games, gardening or baking, our days are filled with friendship, laughter and memory-making.
Ginger the cat and Bluebell the bird, are always there if we need a word.
A tweet, a meow or listening to the cows, it’s all a part of this noisy family house.
Whether relaxing or busy, not matter what our mood, we all come together when the kitchen dishes up great food.
We are one big quirky family, but we are not daft, although the same can not be said for most of the staff!
Residents also enjoyed science week, they experimented and made a ‘walking rainbow’ and talked about how different substances react together. Finally, they held a Back-to-school theme day which commenced with an assembly and singing all the old favourite songs including ‘All things bright and beautiful’.
“Everyone enjoyed our recreating a school day,” said Wellbeing Coordinator Jodie Clayton. “Over the past few weeks, we have talked about our residents’ school life. The games they played, school meals they enjoyed and subjects they loved or hated while at school. We used all this information to recreate a fun school day here at Beech Lodge. We started the day with an assembly, singing all our old favourite songs! At lunchtime, we enjoyed an authentic school dinner menu featuring bangers and mash and rice pudding with stewed plums. We then spent our afternoon enjoying playing marbles, conkers and Hopscotch and taking part in some spelling and times table tests!”
Photos and videos of the activities at Beech Lodge can be seen on the home’s Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/beechlodgeccc. For more information about life at Beech Lodge Care & Nursing Home, contact Home Manager Karen Atillo on 01406 423396 or email beechlodge@countrycourtcare.com.
