Exercise ideas for you and your child

Life, if not healthier, can be very stressful. No matter how much you try to ignore exercising, you just can’t ignore its importance. The right exercises can keep one fit without exerting the body and can also do wonders to our mental health. Exercises are the most prominent way to a healthier lifestyle.

What is the right age to start exercising?

One is never too young or too old to stay fit and healthy. And yes, speaking of too young, children more than five years or so can ably fit into a weekly exercising schedule without tiring themselves out. As for the age to stop exercising- there isn’t any. You can always squeeze in minimalist exercises into your daily routine no matter how aged or diseases you have become. Because the term exercise does not always imply exercises that require a lot of physical strength or that wears the body out.

Read | Importance Of Physical Activity For Children

Why is it important for kids to exercise?

Kids nowadays are more flopped in front of screens rather than playing out with friends. And even if they did, the pandemic has changed it all. Kids now sit for hours in front of their screens attending online classes and completing assignments digitally. Other times, they are busy playing video games or board games. And even if they are doing productive tasks like reading or drawing, they are actually spending a lot of time sitting idly.
It is very important to get the kids moving, or they could face serious problems in the long run.
Importance of parent-kid exercise sessions

Children always tend to follow after their parents. They see and learn. They tend to follow the traits of their parents and do things just like the parents do. Hence, as parents, it is very important to be careful about what is being done.

Once children see their parents realize the importance of exercising and actually implementing it into their routine, the kids are most likely to follow suit.

What exercises can you do with your kid and how?

No one ever said that it has to be physically exhausting to be called an exercise. Exercises don not always have to be just running, jumping or lifting weights, especially not when it comes to children. These are some ways that can help you incorporate fun exercising sessions in your and your kids’ routine-

• Makes exercise games for kids. You can have racing competitions with them, just the short ones. Rewarding the winner with small gifts might also do the trick for you.
• Pick out some fun exercises for kids. You can create fun games out of the old boring exercises. For example, you can combine yoga and physical exercises into one. You can also design a fun cardio session with your kid to make them interested.
• Just playing with your kids can also count as an exercise. Play hide-and-seek, play the catching game, this will give both you and your kid a much-needed dose of exercise.
• Play some indoor game exercises with your kid. You can play with hula-hoops and even hide-and-seek indoors.
• You can also encourage your child to help you with running random household errands like walking the dog or cleaning the garden to get them their daily dose of exercise.
• Dancing it out is the most fun way to exercise. Also, which kid doesn’t enjoy jumping around with or without random beats?

Some exercises that you can try with your child

Here is a compiled list of the easiest exercises out there that you can try with your kids-

• Step-Ups: This is one of the easiest exercises that can be done both by adults and children. You just need a pair of stairs and hola! It’s as easy as it can get.
• Bear Crawls: Now this one’s an exercise and a game combined into one. Bear crawls just require you to be on all fours on the floor with an arched back. And there, you can go on and have a bear race now.
• Jumping Jacks: Jumping jacks are the OG classics when it comes to exercising. We all did it as kids and not gonna lie, those jumping and clapping our hands above our heads was real fun.
• Butterfly Kicks: This exercise is as easy on lying on your bed, literally. All it requires is you lying down on your back, raising your feet and rolling them around in circular ‘kicking’ motions. Sounds fun?

There you go, we hope these basic exercises help you and your kid. Also thanks to these exercises, we will now have spent more quality time together. What better can it get?