In the town of Shikatsu, Aichi Prefecture, an effective method has been adopted to prevent senile dementia. It is called a “memory-method approach,” and involves elderly people discussing their memories among themselves.

One of the participants said, “We went to school with a handmade cloth bag on our backs.” Another said, “We called a pencil box ‘fudezutsu.’”

They talked without interruption, switching from one subject to another, from umbrellas to school records and lunches. Their memories were surprisingly vivid, and the coordinators paid attention so that every participant talked.

The memory-method approach stabilizes the elderly people's state of the mind. They remember things relatively well even if they suffer from cognitive disease. They scrape together their memories and, in their minds, return to the course they have taken. By practicing that procedure, they reinvigorate their brain and gain the courage to meet the current circumstances they face.

The memory school was opened four years ago. The town's museum of folklore, in which about 100,000 pieces of houseware and toys, such as washtubs, folding dining tables and traditional cooking stoves commonly used in the Showa Era (1926-1989), are crammed, played a large part in establishing the school. The fact that elderly people who visited the museum became lively at seeing the articles being shown offered important suggestions to the planners.

0 Comments: