Falls Information Zone:
Level 1 exercises
Video transcipt:
(Professior Dawn Skelton)
So let’s make a start with your Level 1 exercises. Find somewhere in your house that’s safe and secure for you to hold on to. Your kitchen counter or your kitchen chair are good. Start with a good posture, feet hip-width apart, keep your shoulders down and relaxed, make sure you grow tall, and we’re just about ready to start. We’re going to challenge your balance throughout these exercises, s o there’s a certain number of things you want to think about in terms of holding on.
Handholds
In the handholds, you could either start by holding on quite firmly, or you could just put a finger touch, or if you’re feeling particularly confident, you could hold your hand just above the chair, but have it there nearby, just in case.
Easy Marching
We want to warm you up first before we start doing some strength and balance exercises. Easy marching is a very easy way to keep your circulation flowing. So start off with your feet hip-width apart and as you walk make sure you put the ball of your foot down first, through to the heel. Try and keep it nice and relaxed and your shoulders down, and if you feel confident, take your hand off the chair. As you warm up, you may feel that you want to raise your knees a little bit higher; a little bit more of a purposeful march.
Trunk Movements
These exercises are going to help the flexibility of your spine. Start off with your feet hip-width apart, shoulders nice and relaxed, and gently fold your arms in front of you. Make sure you grow tall. You’re going to look over one of your shoulders. During this action, make sure your hips stay pointing forward, and do this movement nice and slowly. You’d repeat this up to 10 times.
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Falls Information Zone:
Level 1 exercises
Front Knee Strengthener
This exercise is important to maintain strength in the muscle at the front of your leg. Make sure you’re seated firmly in the back of the chair, that you’ve got good posture and with or without an ankle weight, extend your leg. You can see that the movement is done relatively slowly, and there’s a slight wobble at times, which is your muscle working hard. You could do this in front of the television. Repeat up to 10 times on each leg.
Side Hip Strengthening
These exercises are important to maintain good muscle strength in your legs, and in particular to get out of the car more easily, or out of the bath. Start with your feet hip-width apart and holding on. You can do this exercise with or without ankle weights. Just take the leg out to the side slowly and hold it for a count of 4 or 5 seconds. As you take the leg out, try to stay nice and upright, and do the movement very slowly and controlled. Keep looking forward and keep a good posture.
Calf or Heel Raises
Our ankles are important to keep strong. They ’re the first thing that keeps us upright. You can do this in your kitchen, looking out the window, or anywhere where you can hold on gently. Raise up onto the balls of your feet slowly and hold for a count of about 4 or 5 seconds. Make sure you go back down in a controlled manner, and try not to rock. Each time you go forward, make sure the weight is on the big toe and the second toe.
Toe Raises
These exercises are really important because we need to lift our feet over obstacles. The muscles at the fron t of our feet are often quite weak. Make sure you’re holding on with good posture and standing tall, and try to bring your toes up towards your nose. You may not have quite this level of flexibility, but try to raise them as far as you can, slowly and with control. Each time you do this, keep your stomach muscles tight and your bottom in. You will wobble. This is normal.
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Falls Information Zone:
Level 1 exercises
Sit to Stand
This is a core exercise. It will help improve your strength and balance. You can do this anywhere in your home, but make su re you’ve got a solid chair. Sit forward from the back of the chair to work the back muscles. Make sure you’ve got good posture and make sure you’ve brought your toes back a little bit under your knees. There are 3 handholds you could use. You could push firmly on the arms of the chair; you could have a light fingertip touch; or as you progress you could fold your arms and let your legs do all the work. So let’s make a start. Do the movement nice and slowly and controlled. As you stand up, just move your feet a little bit to get the blood flowing again, and slowly sit back again with control. As you repeat these, you’ll find that your leg muscles start to get quite warm and perhaps a little bit tense. That’s quite normal and shows that it’s having a training effect. Repeat up to 5 times.
(Professior Dawn Skelton)
So we’ve given you a go 2 or 3 times for each of the exercises. Perhaps if you’re not quite yet willing to go and join a class, you might start doing these a little bit more. So for example, in a couple of days, you might repeat the video clip, but do each exercise 5 times. Maybe in a couple of weeks, try each exercise 10 times. You’ll notice the difference, you’ll see your balance and strength improving, and hopefully that’ll give you the impetus to come and join a group.
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