Skip to main content

Movie Scheduling

 


In my original article about showing movies in your retirement community, I spoke about the basics of planning your movie schedule and offered movie suggestions to show in your retirement community. In this article, I will address the rest of the movie story.

As the activities director my goal is to get the residents OUT of their apartment! I don't remember who it was that talked me into showing the movies in their apartments to start with.... but I wish that I never started it. It has been years now since Fridays have been movie nights and residents have the choice of watching from their home or from their apartment. But, after Labor Day, that is about to change! Yeah!!

I started a Monday Movie Matinee feature on my calendar during the summer months last year. This year, it really caught on in the community and they were well attended. I offered free popcorn and punch to those who came to the show. I also showed movies that I felt were the "cream of the crop" for the season.

At my last activities committee meeting, we discussed the movies and my feelings about trying to get residents out of their homes instead of giving them a reason to stay at home.... and the committee agreed. They really liked the idea of having popcorn and punch at the shows, and realized that it was not as inciting after dinner on a Friday night as it would be in the middle of the afternoon.... so it was decided that we would go to Monday matinees. I also had a request to use the closed caption feature on the shows. I think that I will try that and see what the opinion is after a few weeks.

I would love to see the idea of having the movies during the day work out instead of having them in the evening! It will help me also when I can assure that the movie gets started and stopped at the correct time. (I had to rely on our security guard to do it in the past, but now it will be up to me... and I have a new secret weapon that I have to learn how to use.... it is part of the new TouchTown system that I got. The movie can be scheduled into the in-house TV system to run at the right time.)


I found a good and legal website to watch classic movies and documentaries on your computer, IPad, Iphone or Android device. Check out Fullmovies.com This would be great to have on a community Ipad that you can take from room to room for those needing that service

Comments

  1. Well, the residents are not happy with this change. I've tried to stand firm, but it just isn't right. I'm going to try showing "first views" on Monday afternoons with the popcorn and punch in the Auditorium and then the same movie on Friday nights in their apartments only. We'll see how that works! -Martha

    ReplyDelete
  2. Update: I've started using the Monday afternoon time block for educational video series. I have moved the current release films to be on one Sunday in the month with pizza (for a fee) and then rebroadcast it the following Friday night for free as I do my other movies.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

3 Styles of Scavenger Hunts

Boy is it hot outside! If you are like me you may still be looking for indoor activities that are fun for your residents to do. This activity that I will share with you can be done for different levels of care in your retirement community. I encourage you to share it with the other activity professionals that work in those other areas within your own community. The activity is the Scavenge Hunt. This can be done in three different ways and I will describe them below: 1)       The Stay Seated Scavenger Hunt v   Ask audience to bring in items they think will be asked for. Encourage them to fill their purses, pockets, bags, etc. and bring it to the event v   Make a list of items that they could bring with them v   Include items that would be funny, that might have a story to go with them, or that people would be surprised someone would actually have. (Green Stamps anyone?) v   See the list I used v   Cut the list into pieces and place them into a basket v   Ask

Super Bowl Party for Seniors

It is almost here! The 46th Super Bowl game will be held on Sunday, February 5 in Indinapolis. Each year, residents in my retirement community want to have a viewing party for the big game. I believe that it is a fun program to make an activity out of, but not something that I must do every year. Mostly, I don't have this each year because there are not to many ways to change it up, so I don't want to have it become boring. (This is where your ideas would be great to hear!!) This year, we are going to have a party and I'd like to share with you the plans for the evening. Residents are now signing up for the program which is set to start at 6:00 p.m.  This time is perfect in my community because we still serve dinner at noon on Sundays and the residents usually like to attend for the food, if for no other reason. (I do charge them a fee for the food.) We will have the game showing on our big screen tv in the auditorium and tables and chairs set up for the residents to eat

4 Pictures 1 Word Game for the Big Screen

Many of you who have played 4 Pictures 1 Word , know that this brain game is available as an app for your computer, tablet or phone for free. That is great, bu it does not allow a team to play and is not audience friendly if you wanted to present it at your retirement community (or other social gathering).  After some time and effort, I made a 4 Pictures and 1 Word game  slide show that you can use in your community. I did use the app for suggestions and the Internet for the pictures. I am glad to share this with you so that you will not have to spend the hours that I did in creating this game. If you get the urge to make one also, please come back to this blog page and share it.  I played this last week with a group of about 25 independent living residents.We did not get through all of the slides due to time constraints..... but I was glad I did not run out of slides in my hour that I had their attention. I will be playing this with them again... and would love to have other