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Fitness for the Whole Family - Featured Article:
Fitness Fun for the Entire Family
by Silvana Clark

ABC’s of Fitness Fun

Pre-schoolers love nothing more than jumping, running, skipping, hopping, rolling, sprinting, somersaulting, whirling, dashing and being active. Put some of that energy to good use by incorporating a little education with movement. Find a set of ABC cards or an ABC book. Let your child select a letter and then try the corresponding physical fitness activity.

A: Act like an animal. How does a snake move? Can you slither on the ground? Try hopping like a bunny or flapping your arms like a hummingbird and fly all around the room. Can you act like a kitten playing with a ball of yarn? The yarn might roll into many rooms, so you’ll have to follow it.

B: Bouncing Tiggers: What does Tigger like to do? Bounce! Pretend you are Tigger and bounce all around the room. Can you bounce backwards? Get some friends and have races bouncing from one place to another. Sing Tigger’s song as you bounce and bounce.

C: Crazy crawling: Spread out kitchen chairs and try crawling under and around them. Get a stopwatch and try to beat your time. If you are too big to crawl under chairs, try crawling under the table instead!

D: Dramatic drawings: Use your arms and a pretend marker to draw giant pictures on the wall. Guess what your child is drawing. Now lie on the ground and use your foot to draw a picture. Can you tell your child is drawing a dinosaur?

E: Energizer bunny: Try imitating the Energizer bunny. Get a pot and wooden spoon to use as a drum and march through the house and yard at a fast, energetic pace. Will your child’s battery ever die down?

F: Floating feathers: Put some soft music on and “float” around the room, pretending to be a feather. Try to be light on your feet as you float gently from place to place. Now pretend that a giant wind is blowing and you float fast and furious around the room!

G: Grab that Tail: Get a partner for this fun grabbing game. Put an 18” piece of ribbon or crepe paper in the back of your pants waistband. About 12” should hang out. Stand back to back with your child, hands on head. (OK, you’re backs won’t touch, but you get the idea!) On “GO!” turn, and try to grab each other’s ribbon tail.

H: Happy Hulas: Dig out the hula-hoop and have a hula hoop contest. See who can keep their hula hoop going the longest. Can you keep the hoop twirling around your neck? How about your ankles? Try using the hoop as a jump rope. Wear a hula skirt for extra fun! If children are too little to actually hula, place the hoop on the floor and jump in and out, or walk around the hoop.

I: Ice Skating: If possible, go to an ice skating rink for cool exercise. If that’s not possible, put on socks and pretend to skate on a smooth floor. Make up a skating routine and have someone judge you like at the Olympics. Can you score a perfect 10?

J: Jerky Dancing: Show your children how to dance the Jerk. Yes, that was an actual dance many years ago. Turn up the music and jerk your body back and forth. See? You are dancing the Jerk!

K: Keep it away: How about an old fashioned game of Keep-Away? Get a soft ball or wadded up sock. The person who is “It” stands between two end people, about 15 feet apart. The end people toss the soft object back and forth trying to keep it away from “It”. If you are feeling adventurous, play this game outside with a water balloon.

L: Let it Leap: Remember playing leap frog with your friends? Simply crouch down on the ground like a frog. Have your child jump over you and then crouch down. Now it’s your turn to jump over her. Try playing Leap Frog and leaping all the way around the outside of your house.

M: Muddy Movements: It’s easy to just walk across a room. How would you move if the ground was covered with thick, wet mud? What if you had to walk through Jell-O? Try moving through a room of pretend peanut butter. Now move as if you had glowing lava under your feet!

N: Nosey Races: Use your nose to win this race! Have a starting line where you kneel on the floor with a cotton ball in front of your nose. Race a friend to see who reaches the finish line first by pushing the cotton ball with his/her nose.

O: Obstacle course: Set up an easy mini-obstacle course. You could crawl under tables, roll over a pillow on the floor and jump over a stuffed animal. Time yourself going from the beginning to the end of the course. Can you beat your time with more practice?

P: Popping Up: Have your child pretend to be scrunched up in a box, like a Jack in the Box. As you turn the handle, suddenly the top flips open and your child pops out! How high can they “pop”? Now pretend you are a tiny kernel of hard popcorn. Suddenly the heat is turned on and you start to POP! Jump around like a whole pan of popping popcorn.

Q: Queen Bee: The Queen Bee is the leader of her hive. Pretend to be a Queen Bee and have your child follow your movements. “Fly” to a flower and jump three times. The other bees will follow you and do what you did. Take turns so everyone gets to be the Queen Bee leader.

R: Rocky Robot Dance: Robots have very jerky movements. Play some lively music. Dance along as if you were a robot. Move very stiffly, with your arms flexed in front of you. If you want, sing along to the music, using your best monotone robot voice. Keep dancing while you sing!

S: Silly Scarecrows: Scarecrows are pretty floppy and flexible. Try walking like a scarecrow with loose arm and leg movements. Remember how the scarecrow in the Wizard of OZ had trouble dancing? Skip, hop and dance like a very bendable scarecrow.

T: Tumbling Tag: Get a bunch of friends (or your family) and play Tumbling Tag. One person is “It” and tries to tag other players. If a player is tagged, he/she has to freeze until another player tags him. Then the two players need to do a tumbling summersault before getting back in the game.

U: Ukulele Air Band: Here’s your chance to perform in a wild Rock and Roll Band! Pretend you have a ukulele, an accordion or a bass guitar. Now start singing and playing that instrument in your Air Band concert. Get moving and jump up and down while playing so you work up a sweat!

V: Very wild animal hunt: Collect all the stuffed animals in your house. Have one person hide them around the house or even outside in the yard. Race to find the wild animals. Here’s the catch: As soon as you find one, bring it to a central location. Then run to find another one. You can only be holding one very wild animal at a time.

W: Workout Video: Watch an exercise video. Wait! Don’t just watch it, move along with the exercise leader! Most libraries carry a large selection of children’s exercise tapes. Check them out and try some new exercise moves.

X: EXaggerated movements: Move around with very big motions. Take GIANT steps and swing your arms all around. If you talk, speak in a LOUD voice. RUN fast with long steps. JUMP as high as you can. Try playing basketball using EXAGGERATED movements.

Y: Yard fun: Go to your yard (or a park) and have some fun. Have someone hide peanuts in their shells for you to find. Play tag. Play hide and go seek. Run around the perimeter of the yard as fast as you can. Now skip around the perimeter of the house. Rake up a pile of leaves and bury yourself. Try to use all the space in the yard for fun activities.

Z: Zippo says: Play a variation of Simon Says called “Zippo Says”. If Zippo announces, “Zippo says hop 12 times”, then start hopping. If Zippo says, “Jog in place”, you better not move! Only do the action if the first words are “Zippo Says”.

Silvana Clark is a professional speaker and the author of eleven books. She has great memories being with her pre-school daughter and jumping, climbing, hopping, skipping and running to get exercise. For information on Silvana's creative parenting workshops, contact http://silvanaclark.com