Learning Objectives
The first learning objective is to recognize how successful engagement and the pursuit of purposeful leisure activities, such as gardening, can improve your psychological well-being and quality of life. I have been a lifelong gardener for over 30 years. It was not until the last 10 years that I actually pursued an interest in becoming a master gardener. It has given me such joy. It has made a big difference to be able to combine my skills as an occupational therapist and a gardener. We will learn why there is a lot of value in gardening activities and how we can use it to enrich our practice.
Our second objective is to distinguish the role of ergonomics outside of the area of work performance, because that is where the practice of ergonomics has traditionally been. In the last few years, I have been using it a lot more with clients outside of the work performance area. I think that is the reason why I want to highlight this as an area of ergonomic practice for other clinicians. For those of you who are not that comfortable with ergonomic consulting, I think you will recognize that as OTs we learn basic ergonomic principles and apply them via the preventative wellness or rehabilitative model. Many of you may already be giving those types of suggestions and are not aware of it.
Lastly, I want you to learn some quick and inexpensive ways to introduce the ergonomic principles and techniques with clients.
Definition of Gardening
It is important to know exactly what the definition of gardening is. Gardening is the activity of tending and cultivating plants. It can be anything from a vegetable garden to a perennial garden, or cultivating a succulent-type of garden out West. Gardening is holistic, and as noted in the definition, it seems so simple. However, what I like about gardening is that it requires a lot of different skills, and that is why it is often used in mental health and rehab as therapeutic interventions.
Gardening Skills
Cognition
You need to plan and develop your garden, and sequence the different tasks.
Physical
You need the physical skills to tend the garden. This is the area in which I work most with clients, giving them suggestions to improve their physical skills. They have to be invested in the process and that emotion is what hooks them into the whole activity. It is not so much the end product but the whole activity that is rewarding.
Gardening as Occupation
Gardening as an intervention goes back as early as 1932. It makes sense to use as an occupational therapist because we are looking for interventions that are sustainable; it supports a lot of healthy habits such as eating nutritiously, using it as a form of exercise, and connecting us with others. If anyone has ever been part of a garden club, you know that it also provides a big social connection. There can be an elevation in mood that comes from being able to physically exert yourself in a garden and then see the nurturing process to completion. It is a very holistic type activity and there are a lot of good things that come from gardening as a practice.
Interventions that are effective in improving occupational performance can be described as practicing, doing, active activity, repetition, skill building, and relearning. These are the types of interventions that are part of the gardening process.
I have had a passion for gardening for a long time. I became a master gardener and looked for opportunities to volunteer and serve the local community. In the past 10 years, I have been concentrating on using this as an intervention with my clients and plan to do in the future as well. I have also been doing smaller publications on garden ergonomics. I teach body friendly techniques for gardening and suggest the adaptation of tools to assist gardeners with this occupation. We need to use the science of ergonomics to help design or modify tasks or tools to fit the human body and not the reverse. Gardeners get injured when they try to adjust their body to the situation.
