Why Arts and Crafts Benefit Seniors
Aged Care Auckland
Arts and crafts are something we begin practicing in early life and unfortunately can tend to get phased out of schooling around the same time as we learn how to write. But, in the senior retirement community, arts and crafts are a popular activity that many partake in, so why are these communities finding so much value in the practice of arts and crafts?
Simply put, arts and crafts are a fun activity that helps to maintain your fine motor control skills. Fine motor skills are the small precision movements of muscles, like typing on a keyboard. Without constant use, this skill can wane and become rusty. Practicing this skill with arts and crafts is a fun, engaging, and vibrant way of keeping in touch with your body.
Cognitive Benefits
We have briefly touched on the physical benefits of arts and crafts, but there are also lots of other great benefits to be found with practising arts and crafts. Depending on the type of craft, the skills required can be very technical, which requires a lot of brain power.
Any time that you use your brain you help to keep it in shape. Having a daily practice of things like hand-eye coordination, planning skills, and cognition in terms of visualisation and development of a project is a great workout for the brain, and can really help to keep the mind sharp.
In retirement communities keeping on top of and tracking changes in cognition is often a priority, so taking a few hours a day to practise some arts and crafts also helps to keep track of any gradual changes in how your brain is reacting to the outside world.
There might even be the potential for this daily practice to help keep your brain from declining. Regardless of whether or not this decline can be stopped, every bit of practice and use of your brain is great for maintaining cognition. Therefore, practising arts and crafts is a good way to spend your time when trying to keep up your brain health.
Emotional and Psychological Benefits
As most people probably remember from childhood, taking the time to do arts and crafts is just fun. Even if you don’t usually go in for the typical painting of a still life, practising art could look like painting your favourite scene from a movie, sketching a new technical design, or even finger painting.
Crafts are a whole other story, with nearly anything becoming possible with the right combination of imagination and creativity. These two put together often results in a seriously fun time, which can have a superb effect as a mood-booster, and leave you feeling accomplished for weeks.
The best part is, most arts and crafts creations will stand the test of time. This means that usually, you can take your creation home, and take a moment to look at it whenever you feel like you need a bit of cheering up.
Engaging in creative pursuits is obviously a great way of reducing stress, and stress has been well-established as a leading or contributing cause to many illnesses.
Social Benefits
One of the best parts of arts and crafts is laughing alongside someone while you try and figure out where you are going next with your creation. You can tell the story of making the art piece to friends, and you can share your emotions with others through the medium of art or crafts.
All of these scenarios help to create social connections between yourself and your peers. These connections are essential to creating a holistic and well-balanced lifestyle through your retirement years, so having arts and crafts nights or activities scheduled together can help to maintain and strengthen those friendships.
Physical Benefits
As mentioned, arts and crafts are astonishingly good at maintaining the control of the fine motor system in the body. However, arts and crafts are also just a great excuse to get up, get out of the house, and get moving. The feeling of achievement derived from crafting something may even evoke the sensation of triumph, prompting you to consider a celebratory victory lap around the room!
Getting up and getting the blood pumping is always good for physical health, and anything that can help to maintain fine motor control and dexterity at the same time is a great plus. We can assure you that arts and crafts are a great choice of low-impact activity for physical health.
Arts and Crafts at Ranfurly Village
Ranfurly Village has a long history with arts and crafts, and has creativity woven into the fabric of its existence. One of the most exciting annual events is the Spring Fair, where creators show off their arts, crafts, and culinary accomplishments to the surrounding community.
All throughout the year, Ranfurly Village has plentiful access to creative pursuits with a designated activities room, as well as the added benefit of several other annual events that celebrate the arts with the surrounding community.
Conclusion
Whether you are an old hand at arts and crafts, or haven’t touched something crafty in years, there is an arts and crafts activity at Ranfurly for you. Get in touch with our friendly team today.
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