2025 Sensival returned with a magical twist…
Using the therapeutic approach of Sensology, we transported our residents to the wonderful world of Harry Potter!
Our residents started by trying on the Sorting Hat a few weeks in advance and being sorted into Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw or Slytherin. They were then asked to wear their house colours for the day, so they could attend some activities in their houses.
Our Sight station looked at The Four Houses, with bright colours, glittering backdrops and items from the magical world in each of those colours. Our resident Harry Potter nerd and SLTA gave talks about the qualities of each house, and encouraged the residents to explore the enchanting sights.
Our Taste station offered something for everyone, including Spiced Pumpkin soup, a variety of cakes, and Butterscotch Hot Chocolate. We also had lip balms in the flavours of ‘Lemon Sherbet’, ‘Honeydukes Sweets’ and ‘Butterscotch’, for our residents that don’t eat orally.
The Sound station, lead by our Music Therapist, used a variety of music technology and traditional instruments to create a lively atmosphere, along with an activity included to find and piece together the correct notes for the famous Harry Potter theme tune.
Our resident Aromatherapist lead the Smell station, with 8 scents inspired by locations in the magical world. The activity was to smell each scent and correctly pair it with the magical location. This was all done with our Music & Movement Therapist providing calming sounds in the background for a magical ambience.
The Touch station took part in Hagrid’s Hut, a wooden structure built in our garden. Inside there were wall mounted tactile frames that represented different aspects of the magical world, for example feathers to represent Fawkes the Phoenix, and white wool to represent Dumbledore. There was also some sticky, gooey potion ingredients for residents to get their hands into!
As well as our traditional stations, we created a small, multisensory Herbology Greenhouse, which included fresh herbs to smell, soil to dig around in, and ‘highly poisonous’ UV plants to see!
And a mini Diagon Alley, which displayed items from the Harry Potter world. There was an Ollivanders full of wands, a Flourish & Blotts with a range of books, Gringotts the wizarding bank with a philosophers stone, silver and gold treasures and chocolate coins to enjoy, and a table full of general Harry Potter items such as Quidditch balls and paintings.
At the end of the day, each house attended their own ‘Care of Magical Creatures’ class, where we had a wonderful company bring in snakes, tarantulas, rats, tortoise and more! This was a lovely experience for the residents to be up close and personal with animals they wouldn’t see on a day to day basis.
There was a wonderful traditional feast and the famous sweet trolley for all staff and family members to enjoy, so by the end of the day everyone seemed to be full of food, fun and wishing they didn’t have to go back to the real world 😃
