Executive Summary

Canada welcomes thousands of immigrants each year. Some of these immigrants wish to enter the health care field. Some would like to apply their knowledge of health as senior caregivers in entry level positions. Caregivers for seniors in Canada are required to get knowledge of nutrition and food allergies in order to better handle senior meal planning. This course is designed to introduce nutrition/diets and food allergies to entry-level caregivers for seniors.. The course is self-paced and online and can be completed over a period of three weeks. By the end of this course, students will be able to distinguish food allergies and intolerances and identify symptoms when these allergies and intolerances occur in a senior client. They will also be able to identify food restrictions as imposed by religious beliefs. Finally, students will acquire practical recipes to cook nutritional foods for seniors. Besides the four modules, and quizzes integral to pass the course, there are discussion posts where students interact with other members of the online community. Overall, there are two discussion posts.

Type of course

Caregivers for seniors in Canada are required to get knowledge of nutrition and food allergies in order to better handle senior meal planning. This course is designed to introduce nutrition/diets and food allergies to entry-level caregivers for seniors. Learners in this course have some certifications in First Aid, Food Safe, and Serving it Right, and this course is designed to supplement other certifications. The course is planned to last a week every day for two hours. The caregivers in this field will work either in home health setting or independent living context. Home health setting in this context refers to caregivers providing care in the private space belonging to a senior. Independent Living refers to seniors who prefer to live in residences but can handle their daily life independently.

Learner profile

The audience is a cohort of adult learners from various demographic and cultural backgrounds who are interested in entering senior care field. Some learners have professional experience in the field of care while others' experience is only restricted to personal care for elder members of family. For example, some learners have nursing background in their home country, while others aspire to get only some basic knowledge to better handle the needs of seniors in their family. Learners' ages can vary between 30 and 55. Learners have various educational backgrounds. While some have masters degree in various fields, others are high school graduates. Some of the learners are new to Canada and thus may not be familiar with the cultural diversity in senior population.

Learning Gap

Although some learners possess some experience in senior care in either home health or independent living in Canada or their home countries, knowledge of nutrition is an important element that caregivers in Canada should possess.

Target Audience

Adult learners from various educational/professional backgrounds.

Terminal objective

By the end of this course, students will learn about diets and different food allergies and food intolerances in home health and independent living.

Instructional strategies

Learning materials will be demonstrated through via a self-paced online platform and animated videos with voiceover.

Students will watch short animated videos for scenarios and discuss possible solutions.

Students will apply their awareness of the diets in a role-play between a client and caregiver in either independent living or home health setting.

Learning model

Merrill's principles of instruction: I intend to apply this learning model since learners bring their knowledge and the new knowledge is built on their previous one. There are problem-based scenarios which activate their existing knowledge. They are engaged because of the immediacy of the knowledge and application of the knowledge to their real life through tasks.

The instructional designer is the subject matter expert.

The course will be developed in Articulate Rise and will be added on Canvas.

Learning theory

Andragogy:

Learners will bring their own experience and previous personal/professional learnings to the course. They are internally motivated and are interested to apply their knowledge of the course to their immediate employment context.

Course learning objectives

Course objective 1: When working in groups, students will be able to identify the importance of studying about diets in senior caregiving context

Course objective 2: Students will be able to differentiate between food allergies and intolerances

Course objective 3: Students will be able to identify different cultural/religious diets.

Course objective 4: Students will acquire practical tips on how to prepare meals for seniors.

Assessment strategies

A combination of formative and summative assessments together with instructor/peer feedback is used in this course. Students will need to obtain 80 percent of the scores to pass the course.

Formative assessment

For course objectives 1, a quiz will be used as formative assessment to determine the mastery of the course objective. (14%)

For course objective 2, students will create a visual representation (diagram, infographics) to demonstrate the differences between food allergies and intolerances. (20%)

For course objective 3, students will record their videos explaining cultural/religious diets specific to their cultures. (16%).

There is no quiz for module four.

Summative assessment

For this quiz, students will role-play a scene in either home health or independent living setting, in which one of them is a client and the other is a caregiver. The caregiver will try to identify the nutritional needs of the senior resident and explain the proper diet elements. They will record it, add animation and voiceover and present it to the whole class. (50%)

Course outline

Module 1: Introduction to the importance of diets/nutrition and food allergies in senior care

Module 2: Differences between food allergies and intolerances

Module 3: Introduction to cultural and religious diets

Module 4: Meal planning for seniors