This short 1 minute film is about Weaving Tales; an activity that we used recently at a workshop to demonstrate how simple activities like this can engage people living with dementia.

Weaving Tales stimulates our memories of being in outdoor environments which in turn sparks conversation. This leads to a greater understanding between people. It’s not about what you create with someone; it’s about the “journey” you share together whilst you’re doing it.

How it worked……

Working in pairs, the idea was that one person acted as the carer providing a supporting role and the other was the person being cared for. The role of the carer was to elicit information and memories whilst physically assisting with the task of weaving.

We provided a ball of Plasticine with eight small twigs coming out of it and tied one end of a ball of wool to the first twig. People were invited to weave the wool around the twigs, changing wool whenever they liked.

We asked them to talk about specific memories they have of a season. For example does the summer remind them of a certain song, book, or moment in time? We wanted to show that by doing an activity with your hands using natural materials the conversation is more likely to flow as the attention shifts from being pressured to communicate to a more natural conversation.