The senior population is rapidly accepting the use of the Internet and all this new technology.

In fact, Internet adoption has more than tripled in the past two decades.

The Pew Research Center reports that only 14 percent of seniors had Internet in their homes in 2000.

As of 2017, that number has increased to 67 percent for adults over 65.

In addition, 51 percent have high-speed internet known as broadband.

Eighty-two percent of seniors 65 to 69 have Internet, while only 44 percent of those over 80 have Internet in their homes.

Of seniors who do use the Internet, 71 percent are going online daily (https://www.seniorliving.org/tech/).

Socialization is extremely important for everyone, but more so for seniors who have no family or friends near by.

Thanks to technology, seniors today have access to many more social media outlets and ways to connect than ever before.

With the use of free video chat sites, like Skype or Facetime, and wide-spread internet access, seniors are able to be with their families even if living in a different state or country.

They can be at Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner even if they cannot be near them.

With assistance in learning technology, it shows that adding technology to your loved one’s life will benefit their life immensely.

It’s important to use a step-by-step process when you’re explaining technology to someone who’s unfamiliar with it.

1. Explain the value – Showing a senior how easy it is to talk to a friend you haven’t seen in 7 years through Skype, or getting an email back within 10 minutes from a family member, helps them see the importance of technology and what it has to offer.
2. Use easy language – Be mindful of the word choice you’re using. The new words the Internet has created in our dictionary might not make sense to someone who barely uses a computer.
3.  Take it slow – It’s always best to start small and have multiple sessions so you don’t give them information overload.
4. Write it down – Since writing by hand is something that they are used to, get them a notebook specifically for writing down any steps they need to remember.
5. Patience is key – It’s important to stop a lot and take time for them to ask questions. The more engaged they are, the more they will take in and learn.
6. Give them confidence – Celebrate the small victories. Focus on the positives and what they are doing right and they will want to continue using it.
7. Show them free resources – Check out the FREE Courses that we offer here.
8. Get them used to technology – Games are a great way to get them engaged with technology. Maybe they love crossword puzzles, scrabble, or Sudoku.
9. Talk about Internet safety – Show them the best practices on how to create strong passwords. Let them know to never put any personal information out through emails.

Alexa and Google have opened another world for seniors as it is voice-activated, it makes it very simple to use. It can also make the senior feel safe. Alexa or Google can be set up to do a number of things, just a few are listed below:

● Medication reminders
● Call 911
● Play music
● Tell a joke
● Turn on/off lights
● Tell a story
● Read a book

These devices help the seniors feel not so isolated and alone. The devices can also be set up to call their loved ones.

Rick Phelps bought an Amazon Echo in February 2016 and wrote a public blog post strongly recommending it to people with dementia. “It has afforded me something that I have lost. Memory. I can ask Alexa anything and I get the answer instantly. And I can ask it what day it is twenty times a day and I will still get the same correct answer.”
“’Alexa, remind me to take my medicine at 8:00 am and 8:00pm everyday.’ Once you tell Alexa to do this, it will indeed remind you daily to take your medicine.”
“‘Alexa, play New York, New York, by Frank Sinatra.’ ‘Alexa, add paper towels to my shopping list.’ ‘Alexa, what is the weight of an elephant?’…All you need to do for this thing to read any book to you is to have this book on audio. Which I buy all my books like. Since I can no longer read. That alone makes this thing worth its weight in gold to me.” (https://dailycaring.com/amazon-echo-for-dementia-technology-for-seniors/).

There are also a lot of great digital tools available to keep seniors engaged and entertained.

● Tapestry is specifically designed for seniors.
● Facebook
● Twitter
● Instagram
● Pintrest
● Snapchat

Those tools can make the senior feel connected even when they can’t venture out of their home or assisted living community. They can keep up on world events, read recipes, and find out what’s happening in their families’ world. Some seniors even find old friends who live far away and reconnect.

• A national survey of 639 senior citizens yields 352 (55%) Facebook users.
• Four major motivations characterize Facebook use among senior citizens.
• Social bonding and bridging predict most of their Facebook activities.
• Chatting and posting on others’ walls account for most of their time on Facebook.
• The use of landline and feature phones negatively predict time spent on Facebook.

The use of technology helps seniors in so many ways, it lets them be more independent, stay in touch with family and friends, keeps up with world events, and listen to stories and music. We must all help seniors to learn how to use the technology at their disposal to enrich their lives.

This article was brought to you by Donna Nichols of Assisted Living Made Simple, a Senior Placement Agency located in Florida.

In this video, I want to show you a great Google Chrome extension that will record your screen and your video camera for Free.

Whether you are a coach, a course creator or just want to guide a friend or a family member, like in my case, through a craft project, this is a very useful tool for you.

Loom Screen Recorder is a free video recording extension that allows you to record up to 100 videos with no time limit on the length of your videos.

How to download the Loom Extension

On Google, search for “Loom on Google Chrome”, click on the web store and download it.

This is what your plug-in icon will look like:

How to use Loom Recording:

Open Loom by clicking on it.

On the sidebar, you will have the recording options. You can choose to record the Screen+Camera, Screen Only or Camera Only. If you don’t want to record yourself live, you have an option to put a nice picture of you instead.

With the Screen+Cam option, you can choose to record with the Full Desktop setting. This means that it will record the whole desktop background and any other tabs you have open. If you select Current Tab, this will record the tab you are working on only.

In the sidebar options, you can turn your Microphone Audio on and off and choose your Microphone Source. You can also choose your camera source and have the possibility to flip your Camera too.

The Control Menu, as well as a Recording Countdown, can be turned on from the relevant switches.

Your Camera circle can be set to a small, medium and large size and it can be moved to a different part of the screen according to your preference.

You are now ready to start recording. Click on the start recording button and you will be asked right away if you wish to record Your Entire Screen or the Application Window only. Remember that when you select “Application Window”, if there are more tabs open on the same application, it will record all the tabs.

When you start recording, you will see the Red Record Circle in the corner of your tab, if you hop on to the other tab, that circle will move with you.

From the Control Menu next to your camera you can choose X to cancel your video completely. The Pause button will let you pause your video and continue it later. The Red Play button is your finish recording button.

When you click your Finish Recording button, you will be redirected to an options screen.

Here, you can send your video to someone, share it with a link. You can also add a password to the link that you are sharing with anybody. Another option is to change the privacy settings of your video. You can make it private or public. If you do decide to select public, your video will appear on google search. With the Pro Version, you can even add a call-to-action as well.

The Paid upgrade is $10/person/month

In the final page, you will also see a few options where you can edit your video. You can turn off the comments so nobody can comment on your video. If you choose to keep the comments on, you will be notified by email every time someone comments on your video.

You have an Emoji Reaction option. From this section, you can select whether you would like to allow your viewers to download the video and view your analytics.

Finally, click Save to save all the options and publish your new video.

How to Download Loom Videos

You can now download your video and perhaps upload it to Youtube or Vimeo. Your next option is if you want to delete the video completely. And you can Share your video to your social media platforms or embed it into a website. You also have a send to Slack button if you want to share it there.

That’s it! You have officially become a master at how to use Loom! What are your thoughts on it? Are you just using the Free Version of it or did you jump in and get the Pro Version?

Neither my mom nor my dad knew their paternal fathers or their paternal family.

As I got older and had children I started to wonder just who our ancestors were and how much truth there was in the folklore handed down? With the help of genealogy applications and years of research, I can now answer those questions.

Now you are probably wondering what this post has to do with Social Media Training for Beginners.

One of the driving forces behind our desire to put our training courses together was the desire to train and empower seniors to connect on social media sites.

We spend a lot of time in assisted living facilities. As we began to train them and watch their enthusiasm grow we began to realize the wealth of information they held about their own family histories.

By the time genealogy became a passion for me all of my grandparents and my mother had already left this earth for heaven so I did not have the luxury of picking their brains for all that valuable information.

I became painfully aware of how priceless that knowledge really is. I started to think about the fact that I wanted to leave more than my DNA to my children. I wanted to leave them the story of their heritage and the generations that preceded them.

To me, genealogy is the social media for past generations and our seniors hold the keys to unlocking that conversation.

That is why we are working on putting together a hands-on training course for Ancestry and Family Search.

Maybe some of you are like me and don’t have questions at this time in your life but imagine when the time comes that you do your bridge to the past is no longer there.

Now imagine that someone had given your grandparents the tools to document and store the answers to all those questions.

That is where we come in.

We want to help preserve your heritage.

Not only does the next generation benefit, but it gives our seniors a purpose that has immeasurable benefits. I can say from my own experience that researching my family history is one of the most addicting, time-consuming and rewarding hobbies I have.

I just wish I was retired so I could do it all day.

Stay tuned for our upcoming course. If you would like to be notified when the course goes live please take a moment and send us an email.