Let's extend our healthy lifespan! Care exercises to stay active and energetic forever
As we get older, it can become harder to move our bodies, and we may feel our stamina declining.
Some of you might be thinking, “I want to take preventive steps before my body becomes less mobile.”
In this article, we introduce exercise routines for elderly adults to help maintain a healthy body!
We’ll cover a wide range of exercises—from simple routines you can do while seated to slightly more challenging ones.
Use these ideas as fun ways to extend healthy life expectancy, perfect for day services or recreational activities in care facilities!
- [Seated] Fun Health Exercises for Older Adults and Seniors
- [For Seniors] Recommended Easy Strength Training
- [For Seniors] Hand and finger play roundup: Finger exercises that lead to brain training
- [For Seniors] Easy and Fun Core Training
- [For Seniors] Let's try customizing the usual Pa-Ta-Ka-Ra exercises!
- Summary of exercises for seniors: introducing preventative care movements by body part.
- Recommended simple exercises for recreational activities for the elderly
- For Seniors: Fun and Lively Exercise Recreation
- [For Seniors] Stretching Exercises: Easy and Safe to Do
- [Today's Recommendation] Gentle Health Exercises for Seniors
- [For Seniors] Fun Exercises You Can Do While Seated
- For seniors: Enjoyable exercises done while seated, accessible for wheelchair users.
- For Seniors: Effective Recreation for Preventing Care Needs—Have Fun While Staying Healthy
Let’s extend our healthy life expectancy! Care exercises to stay active forever (51–60)
Aiueo mouth exercises for preventing facial sagging and wrinkles
When you talk with others, the things you’re worried about can get resolved and your stress can be relieved.
Older adults also have concerns and things on their minds.
Through communication with the people around them, we hope they can lead vibrant, lively lives.
The “Ai-U-Be” exercises are recommended because they strengthen the muscles used for vocalization.
Try adding exercises that open the mouth wide, stick out the tongue, and stretch the throat.
Once you get used to them, it’s fine to make adjustments, like matching the movements to a song’s melody.
AIUE breathing/vocalization exercise
Because the tongue’s nerves are connected to the brain, moving the tongue is expected to help activate brain function.
Let’s also do some brain training with the “A-I-U-BE exercises,” which involve moving the tongue.
Open your mouth wide for “a,” stretch it sideways for “i,” round it for “u,” and stick out your tongue while vocalizing “be.” Once you get used to it, level up by tilting your face upward, sticking out your tongue, and doing the exercises in time with song lyrics.
Doing these exercises changes the tongue’s position, making nasal breathing easier.
This also helps prevent cold and influenza pathogens from entering the body.
Feel free to add your own variations and enjoy practicing!
Goo Choki Paa-ty (Rock-Paper-Scissors Party)
Shall we all try dancing the “Goo-Choki-Paa” exercise together—just watching it might lift your spirits! This routine is done standing, but it can also be done seated, so it can be adapted to the physical and mental condition of older adults.
Various animals and creatures appear throughout, and their movements are expressed with the hands and feet.
For example, a fist (goo) can represent a gorilla, and scissors (choki) can represent a crab—there are so many ways to communicate using just your hands.
Don’t forget to take a deep breath at the end to refresh your body and mind.
Twisting exercise
In addition to weakening of the legs and hips, stiffness in the upper body—such as the sides of the torso and the spine—can also cause older adults to fall.
Normally, when turning to look behind, the body twists in order: head, upper body, hips, then legs.
However, if the upper body is stiff, the lower body twists first.
As a result, the head and upper body can’t keep up with the twist, which may lead to a fall.
This video explains the importance of keeping the upper body flexible and practicing twisting movements to prevent falls.
The exercises are performed while seated, so they can be done safely.
Extend your healthy lifespan! Care-giving exercises to stay energetic forever (61–70)
ankle weight
It’s about adding resistance to everyday, ordinary movements and turning daily life itself into training.
Since the idea is to use a level of resistance that doesn’t interfere with your routine, the key is being able to do it casually without focusing too hard.
It’s not a training method that applies force in bursts; rather, it involves continuously adding small amounts of resistance, which can make it harder to feel immediate results—that’s the tricky part.
Because it’s done over time, advance planning is important: deciding how long to apply the resistance and how much resistance to use are both crucial.
Guu-Choki-Paa Exercise
The “Goo-Choki-Paa Exercise” is a workout where you do body exercises while making rock–scissors–paper hand shapes.
Because it moves your whole body, not just your fingers, it’s likely to have positive effects on both physical and mental health.
It can be done seated, which makes it appealing because it can be adjusted to the physical and mental condition of older adults.
First, move your upper body while doing rock–scissors–paper with your hands.
Tilting your head upward also engages the neck, making it a good exercise.
Next, do rock–scissors–paper with your feet.
This helps loosen the muscles in your legs and hip joints, so it should be a very beneficial workout.
step exercise
By stepping in time with the music, this routine makes it enjoyable to train the action of lifting your feet.
In addition to marching in place, adding steps in various directions helps you become more aware of hip and knee movements.
Another important point is to set a wide step platform in front of you; by incorporating movements that go up onto it, you can effectively strengthen your pushing-off power.
As you practice while thinking through more complex step patterns and let your body get used to them, this training can also lead to smoother walking.