Supporting Elderly. A Practitioner's Guide

Active ageing means helping people stay in charge of their own lives for as long as possible. Because keeping minds active is equally as important as keeping bodies physically active, there is an urgent need for an educational, cultural and social context. From this perspective, the report addresses the educational needs of educators and staff working with the elderly. This course is part of the Erasmus+ project “SENIOR - Supporting Elderly Needs Is Our Responsibility”, implemented by a consortium of five partners from Italy, Romania, Spain and Poland, aiming at increasing the level of commitment of seniors to participate in activities of education and exchanges of experiences. Educators and adult education institutions play an important role in the development of an enabling environment for an active ageing society. In this context, the report addresses several aspects of education, from the needs of educators that work with seniors to the methods to keep seniors engaged in activities. The course is structured in five modules: Get to know your seniors, Understand your seniors, work with your seniors, empower seniors, value your seniors. The course was developed as per Merrill’s 5 principles of instruction: Problem-orientation: learners deal with issues of real life Activation: prior knowledge of learners is used to activate new knowledge Demonstration: new knowledge is shown to learners Application: new knowledge or skills are used to solve a problem Integration: learners use new knowledge or skills in their real life This course offers organisations and professionals working with seniors the possibility to improve their processes with methods developed at the European level. An array of educational instruments and initiatives are presented to underline the potential of transferring models and good practices across local communities. Currently, there are efforts at the national and EU levels to improve active ageing. The course intends the harmonization of the educational programs for educators and staff working with seniors at the European level can foster an active ageing society. In addition, it aims at developing modern and effective educational models that enable organisations working with the elderly to improve the continuous professional development of staff.