20A01

On the 27th of April, our class collaborated with NTUC Health Senior Day Care (Ci Yuan), and introduced numerous activities for them to carry out. Activities such as Simon Says, Stretching Exercises and a short crash course on ‘How To Age Fashionably’ were carried out over Zoom.

The stretching exercises and Simon Says were particularly chosen to engage the elderly in appropriate light physical movements while they were seated down. The unique presentation, ‘How To Age Fashionably’, involved a few of our classmates teaching and modelling in ‘fashionable’ clothes that were deemed appropriate for the participating elderly. The three activities were carried out in English, Mandarin and other dialects by our classmates.

With the help of NTUC Health, the volunteers in the organisation also aided in translating the instructions to other languages for the elderly. Though the Zoom call only lasted for 45 minutes, it would be an understatement to say that the elderly enjoyed themselves.

Despite technical difficulties, the participating elderly were avidly responding to our activities. Overall, through enthusiastic participation from both our class and NTUC Health, SL Day 2021 with 20A01 was a noteworthy success.

Our SL Day with NTUC Health involved a few of our classmates being split into three groups, each group representing the three activities; Stretching Exercises, Simon Says and How To Dress Fashionably.

Over the span of four weeks, our class came up with appropriate ideas to cover over Zoom. For example, the group managing How To Age Fashionably decided that modelling in fashionable clothes was interesting enough to engage the elderly.

The groups also had to recognise that these activities had to be delivered in different languages, since most of the elderly were not monolingual. Hence, our classmates decided to carry out these activities in both English and Mandarin, with some of them who were more fluent in dialects presenting as well.

As we expected that the Zoom call would be a tough challenge for both the organisation and us, the unsurprising technical difficulties initially posed as a slight hindrance to both sides. Nevertheless, the call ran smoothly after overcoming this challenge.

If given such an opportunity to experience SL Day in the future, further improvements on our time management will aid in ensuring the planned activities run smoothly. This small blessing has enabled our class to widen our perspectives of the needs of the elderly, and we hope that we will be able to work with NTUC Health in the near future, possibly face-to-face after the COVID pandemic has worn down.