Aspiring college journalist Cody here to serve Daventry community

Cody, 17, is working hard to become an investigative journalist, so here at the Daventry Express, we will be featuring his stories, in his own words.

Here's his first article: 'Tackling Loneliness Among the Elderly'.

Astley Care Home in Daventry is a warm, inviting, and award-winning care home located in Daventry. The care offered to people includes: Dementia residential, end of life care, nursing, palliative care, residential and respite and short stay care.

Daventry Hill School has recently developed a partnership with Astley care home. I recently dropped in to have a chat with some of the students from Daventry Hill School, to find out how this is going. Team Pearsons are preparing to undertake some work experience as part of their community inclusion project with the care home once Covid restrictions have lifted.

The class told me they have been nominated to run this project by the class teacher as a part of their community inclusion work. All the students are keen to get involved for a variety of reasons including, making a difference, creating a meaningful experience, having fun, making the residents happy, preventing loneliness, and helping the students towards achieving the bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award.

So far, the students have sent out Easter eggs with personalised cards attached to the residents, they included their skills, talents, likes, and interests.

Recently Daniel Worley, the event coordinator from the care home made a visit the students of Daventry Hill School. Daniel talked about the residents’ skills, talents and the career opportunities available in the care sector. Daniel talked about how all the staff wear different bow ties to show what role they do (Daniel wore a purple bow tie).

Daniel had this to say regarding the partnership: “Astley Hall is a fun and caring environment and we strive to give the best possible care and wellbeing to our residents. It’s been lovely to create a contact link between us and Daventry Hill School to enable a skill swap between different generations. I have recently met the Pearsons class when visiting the school to do a presentation about Astley Hall as they kindly donated Easter eggs and made cards for our residents.

"I am excited for what the future holds. We are looking forward to the pearsons class coming to visit us in our gardens at the end of June for National Care Home Open Week where students will be entertaining our residents.”

The plan is for students to make regular visits to Astley Care Home. They would like to spend time with the residents and do some of the following activities including, sewing, drawing, puzzles, sports days, preparing tea and cakes and singing in the gardens in the summertime.

Some of the students have started making puzzles for the residents; Thomas has made a word search and has said, “I wanted to make some indoor activities as there plenty of outdoor ones.” Isabelle has made a Sudoku and other students in the Pearsons Class have made riddles, dot to dots and colour by numbers. The students have started to think about some of the special activities that they can do to help form a bond with some of the residents at the home.

Sarah-Jane, a Pearsons student, has said, “It will be really great to spend time with the elderly people.”

The Pearsons class will be attending a Buffet at Astley Care Home on the 30th June and will be providing some entertainment. This is the first outing the class will have had since Covid 19, so they are very excited! The students went on to say, they have a wealth of skills and qualities that will help them with their project. This includes communication, teamwork, intelligence, interesting, patience, kindness, humor, art, design, and good at making tea and coffee!

They hope to achieve lots from this experience including their Duke of Edinburgh award, giving the elderly something to look forward too, giving something back to the community, making a difference and showing that everyone can make a difference no matter your age, ability or needs.