Exercise is important for everyone, including your children. While your children may get plenty of play outside during the warm months, it is difficult to get them to exercise in the winter. So how do parents get their kids to move around indoors? Here are some of the easiest exercises you can do with your kids at home.
Running in Place
Running is the simplest way to exercise, and it’s a great way for kids to burn off some energy. The key to these “workouts” is to treat them like “play”. Do short bursts of exercises every day, that way you aren’t burning yourself out.
Jumping Jacks
Jumping is a great way to improve muscle strength and cardiovascular endurance, and there’s no better exercise than jumping jacks. Other examples of jumping could be hurdle hops, tuck jumps, crisscross jumps, or even squats.
Creative Exercise Games
Get creative with the exercises you do. Some examples include squat relays and corners.. For squat relays, have your kids on the opposite side of the rooms. On “go” the kids will run to meet in the middle and do a series of squats. After, they return to the sides of the room, and repeat the process a few times.
Corners is another incredibly fun and energetic play. Put each kid in a corner of the room.
On your cue, have them rotate to a different corner of the room and do a series of exercises. This could be a few jumping jacks, 15 second wall sit, or some push-ups. Let your kids decide which workouts they want to do.
When it comes to getting your kids to exercise, it can be a bit difficult. But with stay-at-home orders, we are all a bit too pent up. Exercise is important at any age, so follow these fun activities at home so both you and your kids can get some form of exercise and a little bit of fun bonding time.
Skipping
kipping is a more coordinated movement that builds upon running and jumping skills, Lucas says. Skipping also improves balance and coordination as well as timing and proprioception skills, or the ability to sense your body’s position and movements.
Follow the Leader
This game lets you exercise your creativity as well as your body.
Have everyone take turns being the leader. March down the hall with your feet lifted high, then turn and shuffle back to the starting point. Flap your arms like a bird and crawl across the floor like a crab. Hop in place, then stretch on tiptoe. Then let someone else be the leader while you follow.
Build an Obstacle Course
Step on and off the bottom step. Scatter seat cushions on the floor and jump from one to the other. Walk backwards around the table, then crawl underneath. Use what you already own, including the furniture, to make a kid-safe obstacle course.
Sensory Prep
As young athletes begin to understand their basic body parts and what these body parts do, it becomes important to start incorporating the vocabulary that will be used to teach specific skills. When this is practiced frequently during warm-ups, kids will be familiar with the coaching cues associated with those skills when it comes time to learn and practice skills.
Here, they will be learning the specific coordination for doing a high-level skip, so they will need to understand the following coaching cues while performing a march or skip.
- Bounce on the toes
- Bounce on the heels
- Bounce on the ball of the foot
- Skip with thigh below parallel to the ground
- Skip with thigh above parallel to the ground
- Skip with the thigh parallel to the ground
- Bend arms to 90 degrees at the elbow
- Bend arms less than 90 degrees at the elbow
- Bend arms more than 90 degrees at the elbow
- Swing hands from back pocket to nose
- Swing hands from behind body to the top of the head
Indoor Ball Games
Playing ball games indoors or outside can be great exercise for kids. Some of the benefits include aerobic exercise, balance, and coordination practice. Plus, kids usually gravitate toward any activity that involves a ball.
Some examples of indoor ball games that don’t require a lot of space include:
- Tossing balls into laundry baskets
- Hitting balls at a target with a household object
- Catching balls with a plastic mixing bowl
- Throwing, rolling, or kicking a ball against the wall