Volunteering is truly inspiring!
In general, I believe volunteer work requires a ceaseless amount of effort and energy. As well as those elements, determination and encouragement is vital to lead a successful experience. Thus, I have chosen to take on the challenge of committing to volunteer work at a senior retirement home as another CAS Service activity.
At the start of our two-week autumn break, my friend and I decided to visit a senior retirement home located in our village to ask whether we are able to help and volunteer there regularly during our holiday. We walked there together on a Sunday looking for someone in charge however the nurses were the only ones available. They advised us to return the following day as the social worker manager will be present and she will be the right person to discuss this with.
From the Monday, 6th of October onwards, we were officially accepted to volunteer for a couple of hours during the weekdays there at Bonifatius Retirement Home. We met, discussed and planned with Ms Brill, manager of the Social Service (in German: Sozialer Dienst), what we would be willing to do and demonstrated our perseverance to her. On the same day, we started our first activity with the inhabitants by supporting them in an Arts & Crafts session. I was slightly shy at first but Ms Kirszniok helped us to get comfortable talking to the elderly by asking them simple kind questions and giving them advice as to how to be more creative when it comes to making the bird houses. She informed us that some might be reluctant to do these group activities as they consider them to be childish, when in fact they would be training their cognitive processing and expanding their creativity whatever their age. We stayed from 10 O’clock until noon on our first day.
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| Decorating bird houses with the elderly ladies on Day 1 |
This will be a very purposeful activity to increase my people skills and to learn to interact with seniors citizens who deserve respect, care and attention. Nevertheless, it is a personal challenge to engage with them because it will be in German, my second foreign language, and because I must be continuously committed to provide them with assistance. By volunteering regularly, I will build on my self-esteem which will be very beneficial in the future as I engage with people wherever I may go. Additionally, gaining extra work experience is always rewarding.
Throughout the two weeks there and even after that, Ms Brill will be our supervisor as well as her colleagues Ms Kirszniok and Ms Nowak. I truly hope to achieve all eight Learning Outcomes as I dedicate my free time for this CAS activity continuously.
On Tuesday, we attended a discussion round regarding Oktoberfest, a classic German festival that has now become the world's largest funfair festival held for 16 days, in the two weeks leading up to October; where over 6 million people visit every year. We were to invite the senior citizens by knocking on their apartment doors and asking them if they were interested to come join this discussion group. I felt more confident to approach them this time however, I did not act as natural as I normally would around them. As they gather around the main table, we began offering them beverages and helped them to their seats before Ms Kirszniok would introduce them to the topic. It was a great activity that I learned from, as I had not known so many facts about Oktoberfest before, and it benefitted the elderly by memory recollection and processing.
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| Discussion round on Oktoberfest |
The next day, we played indoor bowling and board games with the elderly living in the first floor, as most were handicapped and unable to be as active due to old age. My friend and I assisted them during bowling and cheered them on as they played eagerly. An hour later, we played Memory Cards with two women who we soon started to converse with about our current interests. It was an enjoyable two hours and it was uplifting to know that you were somehow able to help those who have supported past generations long before our generation.
By Friday, we were familiar with the environment we worked in and were very comfortable with the people living and working there. Frankly, I felt that I needed to try and speak more confidently in German with the seniors as it would be better to make mistakes in grammar trying, instead of speaking in simple short sentences that are grammatically safe. This time it was another discussion round regarding Oktoberfest but with another group of senior citizens. Afterwards, we helped them to paint pictures with water-colours!
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| Water-colour painting with Mrs Gersch (left) and Mrs Freitag (right) |
It was overall a productive but exhausting week. I truly admire social workers who work in retirement homes wherever in the world. It requires full-time dedication to care for the elderly and occupy their time with fulfilling activities yet most people do not acknowledge the hard work that they do.
The following week, we organised a grand game of Bingo, had another two large Discussion Rounds about the Autumn season on two separate floors, i.e. two separate groups of inhabitants, and finally an hour-long senior gymnastics session to improve motor coordination in our bodies.
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| Preparing for a game of Bingo! |
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| Noch eine Erzählrunde! |
Throughout the hours volunteering during the two weeks, I learned to be more engaging with strangers as you never know how they will react until you try to interact with them. I believe the reason why most people avoid volunteer work is the fear of trying something completely different, going out and taking a chance to help others whom you are foreign to. As well as the fear of being judged and scrutinised by others for who you are.
My personal fear was conversing in German. However, I am aware now that that is a completely invalid excuse. Developing communicative skills is very important and thus whenever I was able to bring out a smile from them, it felt overwhelmingly rewarding. To think that I was able to influence such a wise aged person to be simply happy in the present moment made my throat numb. I hope to influence them positively every time I visit and to bring them an optimistic vibe into their lives.
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The two week program we had planned for our volunteering with
our supervisors signatures! |
To conclude, the whole experience of volunteering allowed us to complete 22 hours of Service! We continue to visit the retirement home even after the two weeks, once every week during the weekend.
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My Numbers spreadsheet to record my progress during this CAS activity
as well as the hours completed |
I hope this post did not overwhelm you and see you in my next post very soon!
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