Double UP!

It’s hard to get that daily 60 minutes of physical activity in each day for both you and your child. Every minute of our lives is planned out. How do we do it? Well, one way is to double up - take something we already spend time on and make it active. Here are some examples of how you and your child can double up and be active together:

Walking Homework – Grab our child’s flash cards and hit the pavement. If the weather’s nice, we can take a walk while we help our child prepare for his next spelling bee, her math or history test. We’ll get our daily exercise in and boost theirs too!

Cleaning Crew – Round-up your children for a home cleaning session. Working as a team will not only get the house clean quicker, it will also get our children moving and off the couch! Play some upbeat music to keep the mood light and fun.

Outdoor Classroom – Kids love to play in the dirt! Let’s get them outside with us when we plant the garden. Weeding, digging and planting can give bodies of all ages a workout.

Snow Day – Bundle the kids up and get them outside when those flakes fall. Even young children can help us dust off cars – older children can help us shovel. Keeping sidewalks clear can make it easier for our neighbors to stay active too! Reward the family by building a snowman or having a snowball fight.

Team in Training – Consider training for a local 5K walk or race (it’s about 3 miles) with our children. We can get in shape and support a good community cause and reach a goal together.

Run Errands – Get pedometers for our kids and see how many steps we all take during shopping trips. Each of us should be working towards 10,000 steps per day. Parking farther away from the store entrance will help us all reach our goal.

Commercial Challenge – If our family has a favorite television show that we watch together, we can make that active too. During commercial breaks, challenge each other to a jumping jack, sit-up or push-up contest. You won’t believe how much physical activity we can get in during one show!