Exercises With Children: Fitness & Fun At Home

Training is often neglected, especially in the current situation since we cannot go to the gym or the running club as usual due to the coronavirus pandemic. Especially when you live with children, you have to get creative. If you don’t want to miss out on sports despite social distancing, home office, and children, we recommend the following fitness exercises for you at home.

One dad and the other sports scientist have put together a training program in which parents can train with their children. We present three exercises.

The fitness program includes more than 80 exercises that can be done in the park, at home, or in the playground. They are mostly fitness exercises that work with your body weight. The children imitate, play weight, or crawl under, over, or around.

So that the formal training does not degenerate into tears, you should pay attention to a few things.

Parent-Child Exercise

For you, it is strengthening, for your child, a varied game.

• For what? Strengthening the straight and oblique abdominal muscles
• What’s the point? Endurance, stamina
• How old should the child be? from 3 years
• Difficulty level: easy

Your Movement Execution

• Sit on the floor, bend your legs and put your heels on. Activate the abdominal muscles and lean your upper body back. Lift your chest so your back is straight, and pull your shoulders away from your ears. Now rotate your upper body to the right as far as possible.
• Then, in one smooth motion, turn left across the center. Keep your abs active when you have even more power. Lean back further.

This Is How Your Child Trains

Find a few objects – outside that could be small stones, twigs, or grass, at home toys – sit across from you on the ground and put the things next to you on one side. The point now is to move the objects from one side to the other. You can also take a bag out and put it away again.

Hints

• If you feel the back muscles more clearly than the abdominal muscles, come up a little with the upper body or tighten the abdominal muscles more consciously.
• Ensure that your gaze follows the movement, i.e., that the cervical spine rotates in the same direction as the thoracic spine.
• The more trained the abdominal muscles, the heavier the objects can be.

Also Read: 9 Best Exercises For Women Over 50

Exercise With Child: The Crab

The crab is one of the animals among tigers, gorillas, and frogs. Here your child can be active themselves.

• For what? Strengthening of the lower and upper back, abdominal muscles, back of the shoulders, and triceps
• What’s the point? Strengthening the straight and oblique abdominal muscles
• How old should the child be? from 3 years
• Difficulty level: easy

Your Movement Execution

• You start sitting: your feet are up, your legs are bent, your hands are supported behind your buttocks. The hands are turned slightly outwards. Now push your bottom away from the floor and straighten your arms.
• The hands are just below the shoulders. Then you move your hands and feet in small steps forwards, backward, or to the side.

This Is How Your Child Trains

Here you can get creative: Go around yourself and crawl in circles. Try to move forward as fast as possible or stand opposite and tap your toes in turns.

Hints

• As you push up, activate your back muscles by pulling your shoulder blades together and away from your ears. This will take the tension off your neck muscles.
• From this position, you could switch directly to the table in between and hold this position if your child does not feel like running a crab long enough.

Also Read: With Training To A Flat Stomach: 5 Exercises For The Abdominal Muscles

3rd Exercise: Mountaineering

For example, your training device can be a bench, a small wall, or a staircase.

• For what? Strengthening of the thighs, buttocks, and calves
• What’s the point? Endurance, coordination, balance
• How old should the child be? from 4 years
• Difficulty level: easy

This Is How The Sequence Of Movements Works

• Stand in front of a bench and step up with your right leg.
• Activate the glutes and trunk muscles, push yourself off with your right foot and immediately pull your left leg up until your thigh is at least horizontal. As soon as you stand upright, step off with your left leg, then with your right. On the next rep, start with your left leg.

This Is How Your Child Trains

Your older child can take part here. The exercise becomes more intense if you carry your baby or toddler in front of your body as additional weight in the baby carrier.

Hints

• At first, do this exercise slowly and in a controlled manner until you no longer wobble. Only then increase the pace. Activate the core muscles for more stability.
• Make sure that the knee of the attached foot remains stable and perpendicular above the foot and that it does not tilt inward.

Variants

• If you do the repetitions first with one leg, then with the other, you strengthen the muscles in a more targeted manner and train more strength endurance.
• If you are confident in your technique, you can also do the exercise jumping (without a baby!). This will improve your speed.

The exercises are from the book “Powerpapa! (Power Papa!) – The Best Fitness Program For Fathers”. The book is for parents who are wondering how they can get fit in addition to their job and at the same time spend more time with their child or children. Over 80 exercises, described and illustrated in detail, show what functional training with the next generation can look like. The gym is being replaced by the park, the playground, or the home.

Also Read: Squats – Exercise For Strong Legs And Beautiful Buttocks