Diana Oz: Making fitness a family affair

Kids have boundless energy, or at least they should. You'd be surprised how un-fit many kids can be. Of course young children do not need to start a workout regimen but when they start to get about middle school age it's a great idea to get the entire family into being healthy and active.

This has always naturally come to my family considering my line of work. From the time Taylor was a toddler she was involved in some way; sitting on her dad's back while he did push-ups, getting a piggy back ride from me while I did lunges across the back yard, mimicking my back yard workout moves...
As she got older and started playing sports she became more involved in our activities. In the summer we would hit the lakefront trail as a family and do the exercise stations down the path from Diversey Harbor, if she had a day off school and tagged along to one of my boot camps she would want to jump in and often calling out campers for doing push-ups on their knees (Yikes!) and now that she is a young athlete she participated in conditioning over the summer to stay in shape for soccer season.

There are lots of ways to be active with the kids. My daughter is only 11 so she is not on a hard-core workout plan. She has soccer practice 2x per week and 1-2 games per week. This is quite enough in season. When she is working out with us over the summer we try to keep it fun and light. She has not worked out with anything more than her own body weight. We have gone for short runs, sprints (which she loves because she is way faster than me!), played exercise games and partner exercises. I keep the plyometric work low for her since all her joints are still growing and not yet set. Besides light jogs and agility we work on planks, do push ups, bear crawls, lunges, core and lots of stretching. You'd be surprised how UN-flexible kids are.

As I mentioned she does this in the summer when not playing soccer and this past summer was the first time she worked out on a regular basis, 2x per week.

Not every child or family wants to do a traditional workout together. Here are more ideas you can use to get your family moving:

Bike Rides
Hit the park and try tennis.
Go to the beach and take games with you instead of hanging in your chair; volleyball, Frisbee, football...
Walk the family dog together.
Learn how to roller blade.
If your child is old enough try paddle boarding in the summer.
Check out places like Sky High and have fun together bouncing all over the room on trampolines.
Good old fashioned game of kickball or t-ball at the park.

If your kids are old enough and used to hanging out with their ipad or kindle they may groan at first but once you get everyone going they will appreciate the time you are spending with them.