The Meadows is one of our extra-care homes for people age 50+. In this blog, Sarah (a keyworker at The Meadows) shares more about their weekly intergenerational activities with a local school. A big thanks to Sarah, our team and customers at The Meadows, and the children and staff at Watercliffe Meadow school for making these sessions a success!
The relationship between The Meadows and the local primary school Watercliffe Meadow began in 2017. The children used to come during the residents’ coffee morning on a Thursday and join in with the quiz. Then, in 2020, the pandemic struck and the children couldn’t come for a while due to lockdown and the various restrictions. During this time there was still contact – the children wrote lovely letters to the residents and sang carols outside in the cold at Christmas!
As things returned to normal, we restarted the group again in 2022. We changed the day to a Wednesday afternoon to facilitate activities that were more child friendly, which encouraged more interactions and allowed more meaningful relationships to develop.
Activities usually include games, crafts and reading. When the weather is warm, we work outside in the nature garden, which the children have helped to create and look after. We have two groups of children that come on alternate weeks.
The children and residents have input into what kind of activities they would like to take part in. Some of the children decided that they would like to learn some British Sign Language (BSL) signs as they noticed Donna, one of our residents who is deaf, signing to her parents who also live at The Meadows. We decided to combine this with a party, as this was also a popular request!
Some of our residents are already familiar with basic BSL signs as we have been hosting a BSL café on the first Monday of every month since the spring. This is facilitated by a BSL support worker and interpreter from Sheffield City Council.
We learnt the signs for basic greetings and other words we would need for a party. The children were very enthusiastic and picked them up easily. Donna was amazing and supported me to teach the signs and help everyone to practise them. The party was great fun, we played pass-the-parcel (with interactive forfeits), decorated a biscuit, and enjoyed party food. Everyone had a great time.
We have got some lovely activities planned for the next few months including a visit from Animal Ark (Travelling Zoo and Education Centre) and lots of Christmas fun!
