A special visit to Southfort Bend Gardens was organized by SouthPointe School students during Seniors’ Week (Jun 5-11).
On Monday (Jun. 6), Carole Bossert’s Grade 5 class took a field trip to the retirement home to deliver kind messages and show local seniors a little love.
Eight years ago, Bossert co-founded Seniors and Youth Networking Committees (SYNC) and is passionate about connecting her students with seniors in the community. Her students regularly contact seniors through letter-writing, decorations and artwork.
Unfortunately, the day the students walked to the residence was pouring rain, and seniors could not come out to meet the kids, but that didn’t stop them from showing their appreciation.
“In our classroom, we talk about community building. As a field trip, which we haven’t been able to do for a couple of years because of COVID, we decided to walk to South Fort Bend Gardens to visit our seniors,” explained Grade 5 student Arabelle N.
“We have thoughtful posters encouraging them saying ‘you’re awesome, we love you,’ and we drew positive messages with chalk.”
How did it feel to show the seniors some love?
“It made me feel really proud, and it definitely put a smile on my face knowing that we were putting smiles on other people’s faces,” said Addyson M.
“It made me feel good about how we’re helping the seniors have a good day if they were having a bad day,” William S. said. “It made me feel really good and proud seeing that our class has been making senior’s days and helping people all over Fort Saskatchewan.”
“When we were drawing these posters, we worked as a team. It really came from our heart to them, and when they say they were very appreciative of that, it not only just made their day, but it also made art,” said Arabelle N.
“That makes me feel way better knowing that we made their day even better doing that, even in the rain,” explained Koaden F. “I’m one of the amazing students, so I thought it made me feel really good knowing that we were making those seniors days better.”
Why is it important to go and show some love to seniors?
“I think that it’s really important because everybody needs a sense of belonging, love, acceptance and safety; and when we went there, we really gave them a lot of love and acceptance,” Addyson explained.
“Because these seniors may have lost their loved ones, so by doing that may give them good memories of their loved ones and make sure they remember all those things,” said Koaden.
“We need to remember that there were other people before us and when we made that, we were really thinking about that. It’s important to be a community builder; it’s just showing love and respect to those elders,” explained Arabelle.
Bossert thanked Southfort Bend Gardens for welcoming the class and encouraging meaningful connections with the residents, adding the seniors love the students like their own family.
