For seniors: Enjoyable exercises done while seated, accessible for wheelchair users.
In many senior care facilities, exercise is often incorporated as a form of physical recreation.
However, doing the same activity every day can become monotonous.
In this guide, we introduce exercises that older adults can enjoy and continue without getting bored.
We’ve also gathered safe, seated exercises for peace of mind.
These can be enjoyed by people who use wheelchairs or those who feel unsteady when standing.
From easy-to-start movements to exercises that offer a thorough workout, choose and practice according to the individual’s condition and specific concerns.
- [For Seniors] Enjoyable and Healthy Chair Stretches!
- [Seated] Fun Health Exercises for Older Adults and Seniors
- [For Seniors] Easy and Fun Core Training
- [For Seniors] Fun Exercises You Can Do While Seated
- [For Seniors] Recreational activities and games that let you have fun while strengthening your legs
- [For Seniors] Enjoy the Cold Winter! Seated Activities You Can Do
- [For Seniors] Easy and fun seated activities you can do in your room
- [For Seniors] Recommended Rhythm Play and Exercises
- [Recommended for seniors] Rejuvenating Rock-Paper-Scissors Exercise
- [For Seniors] Simple Recreational Activities You Can Enjoy While Seated
- [For Seniors] Enjoyable Indoor Activities! Recreations and Games That Engage the Mind and Body
- Cognicise you can do while seated. Simple dementia prevention.
- [For Seniors] Leg and lower-back training: Fall prevention
[For Seniors] Enjoyable Chair Exercises for Wheelchair Users: Fun Seated Workouts (91–100)
Prevention of economy class syndrome
Staying in the same posture, like when sitting in an airplane’s economy class seat, can impair blood flow in the legs.
This is a seated leg exercise that helps prevent economy-class syndrome and improve circulation.
With movements like lifting your toes and making big marching steps, focus on how you engage your leg muscles while strengthening them.
Move your feet rhythmically within a pain-free range, feeling the gentle impact of each step.
This can also help promote smoother walking and prevent falls.
cross trainer
This training machine helps you focus on the forward-stepping motion essential for walking and running.
Its standout feature is the alternating, rotational movement of each leg, which gives the impression that it strengthens your pushing power as well as the motion of the knee and ankle joints.
Because the handles assist your leg movements, you can gradually build lower-limb strength—this is a key point.
Adjust the resistance to firmly train your forward-driving power while keeping your attention on the leg movements and rotational action needed for walking.
What shall we make with rock, scissors, paper?
The “Goo-Choki-Paa de Nani Tsukurou” exercise is a song that many older adults are familiar with.
Those with children may remember singing it to them often.
This hand-play song involves moving your body while singing, which provides good stimulation for the brain.
What’s more, just by combining rock, scissors, and paper in different ways, you can create many variations.
It’s a hand-play song enjoyed by a wide range of ages, from children to seniors, so it might be nice to try it together with your grandchildren.
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.
Guu-Choki-Paa Exercise
The “Rock-Paper-Scissors Exercise” is recommended for preventing dementia.
There are many nerves in the fingers, and since they connect to the brain, using them helps activate both mind and body.
The best way to prevent cognitive decline is to use your head while moving your body.
The Rock-Paper-Scissors Exercise combines all of these elements.
This time, we’ll switch rock, paper, and scissors between the left and right hands.
Alternating movements provide good stimulation for the brain.
Let’s all enjoy doing it together.
Finger exercise with rock-paper-scissors (gu-choki-pa)
The Rock-Paper-Scissors exercise is highly recommended for preventing dementia in older adults.
Finger exercises are something we do casually, but many people may not realize that they’re directly connected to the brain.
By moving your fingertips a lot, you can stimulate and activate the brain.
The Rock-Paper-Scissors routine introduced here includes plenty of fun variations, so it’s likely to get some laughs too.
Exercising while having fun is great for building a healthy body.
Let’s laugh from the belly and aim to relieve stress.
Cognicise exercises and patakara exercises
It’s a program that trains the whole body while thinking, combining complex foot stomps and handclaps with the articulation of “pa-ta-ka-ra.” It starts with a simple flow of pronouncing “pa-ta-ka-ra” in time with the steps, then gradually becomes more complex by adding handclaps.
The key to adjusting difficulty is which letter of “pa-ta-ka-ra” you match the clap to.
Have participants try each letter in sequence so they can feel the increasing challenge.
It’s also important to ensure they don’t focus so much on the clap timing that they lose attention to the “pa-ta-ka-ra” articulation.