If you’re looking for a few Olfactory (sense of smell) activities for your Alzheimer’s residents then keep reading to learn 6 easy-to-implement activity ideas to add to your senior activity calendar.

With sensory stimulation activities becoming a bigger part of a nursing facility’s activity program, it can be challenging trying to find new sensory activities that are fun and meaningful. Here are a few aromatherapy games to consider adding to your monthly activity calendar for your senior residents.

1. Name That Smell

Encourage residents to test out their olfactory skills while playing a fun game of Name That Scent. For the activity, use a fragrance kit and pass around smelling strips that have been sprayed with different scents. Encourage residents to write down their choices. Then at the end, award a prize to the person who correctly identifies the most scents.

Blindfold residents as you place dried spices from your facility’s kitchen into small cups or jars for residents to pass around and smell. See if they can identify common spices like cinnamon, sage, rosemary, and thyme. You can use everyday objects as well, like rubber bands. You can also put cotton balls inside the jars with a few drops of essential oils on them, to create a blind smell test where you remove the visual clues. 

2. Top Scent Dice Game

Invite residents to play the fun aromatic table game, Topscent. To play, seat residents around the table, and have everyone smell the same scent. Then roll the dice. Without speaking to the others, each resident must then try to collect the cards in the deck that match the scent of the vegetable or fruit that they smelled. Once they have accumulated the matching scent enough times that matches the number rolled on the dice, they can place their hand on the top of the deck and win the stack. The person with the most cards at the end of the game wins.

3. Play Scented Dough Pictionary

Supply residents with scented Play-Doh to play a fun game of scented Pictionary. To play, divide residents into teams, and provide a member of each team with the name of an object (an apple, a cat, a bowl, etc.) to mold with the scented dough in under a minute. If their teammates correctly guess the object, then award a point to the team. Next, have a different member of the team be the sculptor to try to mold the next object, and so on. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.

4. Give Hand Massages

Invite residents for free hand massages in your Activity Room as you use an aromatherapy lotion to massage their hands. Have a sign up sheet and bring a timer so you can keep on schedule to make sure everyone gets a turn. You can have residents soak their hands in a warm water mixed with hand lotion or essential oils to start the relaxation process as they wait for their message. To do this, set up plastic dish pans right on the table top with a towel underneath. Try soothing music to set the tone to calm and relaxed. 

5. Play Fragrance Bingo

Yes, you can play bingo using fragrances! With the Follow Your Nose Game residents can smell a variety of aromas to match up with the pictures on their bingo cards. Award a fun prize to the first person who finds the six scents that match their card.

6. Make Scratch-and-Sniff Stickers

Recruit residents to make scratch-and-sniff stickers for their grandchildren by adding essential oils to these adorable & absorbent felt stickers. Encourage residents to send the stickers to their grandchildren as fun Back-to-School gifts or use as scented embellishments for card making activities.

As a one-on-one activity, provide your resident with scratch-and-sniff stickers for a fun aromatherapy discussion. For the activity, have your resident scratch a sticker, smell it, and then try to describe the aroma. Be sure to ask a few follow-up questions, like “Do you remember smelling this scent before? or “What does the scent remind you of?” Use the scent to begin a discussion with your resident about past events and fun memories.

Find additional aromatherapy ideas for seniors here!

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About Not Just Bingo:

Not Just Bingo is an online resource of fun, senior activity ideas for activity professionals of nursing homes and assisted living facilities. They have been providing fun activity ideas online since 2009, and continue to assist activity professionals across the country by creating meaningful and engaging activity ideas for their residents that go “beyond bingo.” Not Just Bingo feels privileged to help activity directors better the living experiences of their residents while demonstrating that a senior’s quality of life can actually improve when they move to a nursing facility!

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