Caledon Seniors’ Centre continues to support community throughout pandemic

By Rob Paul

Every demographic has felt the struggles of the COVID-19 pandemic, but few have been put in as precarious a situation as that of seniors.

Seniors are at higher risk and often live away from their families and sometimes are unable to live their lives without support from others.

This has made it more important than ever for seniors in their communities to have a helping hand and to stay connected with others through remote options.

That's why the Caledon Seniors' Centre has been there for them the last 22 months.

The not-for-profit has become one of the most important charitable organizations in Caledon and has never wavered from its mission to provide the opportunity for older adults to come together to fulfill many of their social, educational, cultural and recreational needs.

Though they've had to pivot throughout the pandemic, the Caledon Seniors' Centre has continued to provide programming for seniors across the Town.

With the recent move by the Government of Ontario to move the Province back into Step Two, the Seniors' Centre shifted everything back to virtual and remote.

With the inability to have seniors inside the building due to restrictions, the Seniors' Centre has been providing healthy meals for pickup to ensure members are eating and getting out of the house.

“At the centre right now, we only have people who work there, and we can't have more than five people at a time in the building,” said Cheryl Sampson of the Caledon Senior Centre. “What we're offering is brownbag lunches on Mondays and Wednesdays. They can phone in and order a soup, sandwich, and a dessert and we give them the choice of egg salad, tuna, or salmon on white or brown and then usually we offer two soups. There's a need for some people to get out or maybe that's the only time they can get a fairly nutritious meal. We also do monthly dinners on the last Friday of the month. It's all takeout and they drive by and we hand it to them and they don't have to get out of their car. We also have special lunches for takeout too. That stuff is for pickup at the Centre, but everything else is either virtual over Zoom or over the phone.”

The Caledon Seniors' Centre isn't only aiming to keep their community connected through online programming but they're also providing fitness options to stay in shape and purely a phone line for socializing.

“We have exercise classes on Zoom so there's standing exercises and chair exercises and we also have high intensity exercises with an instructor—that has a minimal fee for a $1 per Zoom drop in—and that's twice a week,” Sampson said. “There's also a group for the carpet bowlers and they're a very social group, so what we've done is we've turned that program into a ‘party line' where everyone phones in and they can chat with each other and keep connected with each other without leaving their homes. It's a safe way for them to visit and they may not be bowling but at least they're checking in with each other and still socializing.”

Not every senior has access to a computer so, keeping that in mind, the Senior' Centre has programming through not only Zooms and apps but via the phone to make sure every member is able to take advantage of what they're offering.

“There's people who don't have computers out there and we have quite a few who are just learning to use computers and aren't sure how to,” she said. “In past lockdowns, we've done one-on-ones walking them through how to use Zoom so that they can participate. So, on the phone we have the carpet bowlers where they just socialize, trivia, word games, and family feud all on the phone. Bingo is also over the phone, and I had a group who most didn't have computers. On Zoom we have singalongs so they can see the words, we have travelogue on Zoom, Punjabi bingo on Zoom. We do have a book club too that meets on Zoom once a month. So, it's great for people who enjoy reading. We get the books from Caledon Public Library's book-in-a-bag and some people come and pick up the book and others read it online. 

“There's also a ‘lunch and learn' we're doing this month and it's the first time we've done it online—we used to do them in person. This will be a brownbag lunch they can come pick up and then the learn part is on Zoom. One popular program we have is called ‘Trickster' where we play cards. They have to have a computer or iPad and an internet connection to play. It's an app and you can create tables so that you're only playing with the people you know. I make groups every week and everybody can talk and there's an optional video aspect to it. We've even done the odd Trickster euchre tournament.”

Having been in person in recent months, moving back to everything being online or over the phone wasn't too big an issue for the Caledon Seniors' Centre because they'd done it all before and so had their members.

“This time it wasn't too bad because we had a schedule that we had used before, so we looked at it and changed things based on it,” she said. “Whereas at the very beginning it was all new. Within the week (of moving back to Step Two), we had a few programs running. Some of the well-known programs were already running anyway, and we'd just let everyone know everything is a go online or over the phone. Even when we were allowed to be in person and had people coming in, we still had a few over the phone. It was easier this time because we kept all our paperwork from the last time, so it was easy to switch back over.”

The importance of providing programming for seniors in Caledon in times like these can't be measured because for some of their members this is all they have when the pandemic flares up, and in-person options shut down.

“It's very important because a lot of them live alone and they're not talking with anybody,” said Sampson. “It keeps them active and keeps their brain going and gives them something to look forward to. My mum plays the Trickster cards, and she loves it; she lives in Etobicoke and she's with our centre playing. We also have someone in Barrie who used to be a member that joins in and plays—for bingo we even have a person who joins over FaceTime from England. We can have people from outside of driving distance to login and participate. It's also important to widen your audience (with a variety of programming), otherwise you're just going to have the same 10 people doing everything. You want to be able to reach everybody and make sure you have something for everybody to keep them active.”