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With more and more kids following a sedentary lifestyle, watching hours upon hours of television and playing on computer games, it is little wonder why obesity and poor health is wide spread among youngsters. By getting kids active at a young age and trying to encourage them to enjoy exercise, we are much more likely to see kids remain active into adulthood.
Lets look at some reasons why kids should be active and follow some form of fitness activities:
Below you will find advice and tips for various fitness activities which children may follow, and most importantly, find enjoyable! Please remember that kids usually are very observant. If kids have parents that live poor sedentary lifestyles, why will they think it is a negative path to follow? By being active with your kids and taking part in activities that encourage exercise, you are setting a very good example. You never know, you may find yourself becoming more fitter and healthier too, bonus!
Kids, as we all know, are hard to control. To encourage exercise we must make it as fun as possible so the exercise is engaging for the children, and therefore sustainable.
If explaining how to perform an exercise, be clear and precise. Demonstrate the exercise in slow motion and explain each point at a time, very clearly. If the kids do not know how to perform the exercise or activity then they are more likely to loose interest.
Where possible perform the activities and exercises with the kids, talking the kids through the exercise and giving words of encouragement.
Find popular up to date music with a fast tempo beat. This makes great backing music, and by choosing music the kids like you can create more a buzz and make the exercise more fun.
Regularly change the exercises and the order of the exercises to give variety to the exercise sessions.
Warm up
An exercise session should be started with a suitable warm up. The warm up should allow for the transition of the normal rest state of the child before starting exercise to a state ready for moderate intensity exercise. We do this by gradually increasing the intensity of the exercise during the warm up, such as starting with a walk, increasing to a jog or skipping, finishing with quick jog.
Another popular warm up for kids is north, south, east, west. To do this we assign each wall as north, east, south and west in front of the children, as you and kids the stand in a central position in the room (which is suitable for exercise and free of objects that may get in the way or be a hazard). You then shout out either of the north, east, south, west positions whilst pointing at the corresponding wall. The kids then have to run to the wall and back, awaiting for the next command of another wall to run to. To add more fun (and confusion!) to the equation try shouting out a position whilst pointing at the wrong wall!
An upper body warm up would also be a wise inclusion if you intend on including exercises in your session which involve the upper body muscles. Windmills, star jumps and neck rotations can be great additions to a warm up to warm up the shoulder and neck muscles.
The main session
Any exercise activity you have in mind can now be performed. Circuits, relays, running, a football game, dodge ball, or any other activity can be performed, remember it is important to add variety to your sessions to make them more enjoyable.
Relays are a great way to encourage team work and include a vary of different exercises in one activity. Split the kids into smaller groups, and upon your call the first member of the group runs to the other end of the room (or marked distance) and then returns ready for the next member in the team to do the same. The team who is the quickest at all members completing the relay wins. The great thing about the relay is we can incorporate other exercises within the relay, such as balancing work, strength exercises or cardiovascular activities. An example would be the balancing of a bean bag on the child’s head whilst they complete the first run of the relay to the wall, once at wall 10 press ups (on the knees to make it easier) are to be completed, then on the way back they must dribble a football around some cones as quickly as possible.
Circuits are another great way of including a variety of the exercises and activities within one session. Set up a dozen or so stations around the room which involve different fitness factors, such as balance, strength, endurance, and also possibly one that encourages team work. The kids can be paired up and have 30-60 seconds per station, and 1-2 minutes rest between each station.
Below are some ideas for different stations within your circuit:
Strength
Endurance
Balancing and coordination
Team work
To encourage team work we can also of course include sporting activities such as football, netball, basket ball, dodge ball, British ball dogs, and many others.
Cool down
As the name suggests, the cool down is the opposite to the warm up. We try to transit from the exercised state back to a normal state by gradually reducing the intensity of the exercise.
Make exercise fun. It is as simple as that. If kids find something fun they will continue to do it and reap the benefits of sustainable long term exercise. Do not force or be pushy about exercise, they would soon learn to hate it if this is the case. Speak to the children and find which activities they like and then encourage it. If any of the kids have an interest in a particular sport then also encourage it, and possibly look for additional sport clubs that offer specific training for this.
Another important point is to try to teach kids the importance of exercise and why we should try to keep active. This is best done by making one or two points within each session, as the kids are much more likely to remember and digest small but important points.
Hopefully you have found some useful points above, and hopefully we can encourage the new generation to become fitter and more active.
Back to Bodybuilding, Fitness & Strength Training Articles
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