Week 1: Orchids

On Wednesday, February 15, I visited the Alzheimer’s Activity Center to talk to Amy Hurst, one of the directors of the program. I brought along the three tests that I plan to conduct on the participants before and after all the art therapy sessions.

#1: Wisconsin Card Sorting Test

It is often used for assessing dysfunction of the prefrontal cortex and basal ganglia. It is widely used by psychiatrists and clinical psychologists to test patients with neurodegenerative diseases. The participants are suppose to match the cards by number (1, 2, 3, 4), color (red, green, blue, yellow) or shape (circle, star, square, crosses). Although in the original test, the participant will be told “correct” or “incorrect” depending on whether they’ve matched the card successfully. However, Amy specifically asked me to make all the tests into social activities and refrain letting the patients know that they are taking a test, so anxiety or nervousness does not skew the testing results. Therefore, I made the test into an interactive game and the data collecting sheet into a game board, where I kept the “scores” of the participants.

#2: Line Tracing

Tracing dashed lines can be used as a way to test for hand-eye coordination. By giving the participants dashed straight lines, zig-zag and curvy lines, I will be able to assess their physical adeptness in controlling a writing/drawing utensil. To determine the effectiveness of art therapy, the number of errors made in the beginning and end of all the sessions.

#3: Color Classification

Participants were given several styrofoam board and were asked to group them together. This activity not only tests their ability to sort colors, but also their motor skills.

In the end of our meeting, Amy told me to conduct my first session tomorrow.

The First Art Therapy Session: Life Sketch

Today’s the my first art session with the patients! I brought crayons, coloring pencils, markers, and sketch paper. For the life sketch activity, I brought pink orchids to the Alzheimer’s Activity Center.

The participants were better at drawing than I thought. Although the participants were good at mimicking the flowers, they had trouble finding the right color and opening the cap of the markers, which I did not expect. I was only able to conduct the test on half of the participants, so the other half will be tested next week. The test were more difficult than I expected because in the midst of teaching the art activity, I also had to conduct the test with the members. However, the participants did an excellent job in artistic creation.

Here are some exemplary examples of their work:

The staff member Awilda aided me through this art session. She was really friendly and gave insightful suggestions about the art projects done previously at the Alzheimer's Activity Center. She suggested an abstract hand drawing for the activity next Thursday. Therefore, I will be making a sample painting at home. Can't wait for next week!