[For Seniors] Fun Exercises You Can Do While Seated
When it comes to recreation essential for the physical and mental health of older adults, exercise is at the top of the list.
Not only does it help prevent declines in stamina and muscle strength, but it’s also effective for preventing falls.
However, some seniors may find vigorous exercise difficult.
For those individuals, we recommend chair exercises that can be done while seated.
Moving rhythmically to music makes it enjoyable and easy to stick with.
What’s more, by stimulating the muscles and brain, these exercises can improve circulation and may help prevent conditions such as dementia.
Even those who aren’t confident about physical activity can enjoy these simple exercises, so please use them as a helpful reference.
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- [Recommended for seniors] Rejuvenating Rock-Paper-Scissors Exercise
- For seniors: Leg-strengthening exercises you can do without overexertion.
- Cognicise you can do while seated. Simple dementia prevention.
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- Hand games that liven things up for seniors—also great brain training
[For Seniors] Fun Chair Exercises You Can Do While Seated (91–100)
Different left-right movements for the rabbit and the turtle
This is an exercise where you move your arms widely to the left and right in time with the children’s song “Usagi to Kame” (The Hare and the Tortoise).
Since the exercise focuses on arm movements, if standing and moving your body is difficult, do it seated in a chair.
The basic action is simply extending your arms forward alternately, but by changing your hand shapes and switching movements at cues, it adds a brain-training effect.
With each signal, you’ll change your hand shape or the way you extend your arms, gradually adding elements so you think while you move.
Adding leg movements as well further increases the cognitive challenge, so that’s recommended too.
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.
Rock, paper, scissors in a cross
Crossed Rock-Paper-Scissors is a calisthenic exercise done with your hands crossed.
Instead of just doing rock-paper-scissors normally, you cross your hands, so it’s a workout for your brain, too.
It can be hard to do it perfectly on the first try.
By repeating it, your body will learn the movements.
There are also variations like tapping your feet while doing rock-paper-scissors, or adding hand claps, so give them a try.
They all require mental focus, so it feels like your brain gets a full workout.
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.
Let’s make Pokémon with rock-paper-scissors
Pokémon are popular characters among children, aren’t they? Some older adults might also like Pokémon because of their grandchildren’s influence.
It seems there are as many as 809 Pokémon characters.
Let’s make those characters while singing the “Rock-Paper-Scissors, What Shall We Make?” song.
It might be a bit difficult to express popular Pokémon characters using only your hands, but let’s try to do it well.
Each Pokémon has its own unique features, so explaining those traits would likely make things more exciting too.
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.