How much physical exercise do we need?
The American Heart Association recommends that children who are older than 2 years get at least 30 minutes of moderate-intensity, age-appropriate physical activity each day. If you can't make it happen all at once, break up the segments into 2, 15-minute periods or 3, 10-minute segments.
The same time recommendations apply for healthy adults, though more is always better! Some medical experts recommend that teens get at least 1 hour of physical activity on most days of the week.
You don't have to be at a gym or engaged in "traditional" fitness regimes to hit those goals. Your body won't care if that time is spent moving on a treadmill in a pricey gym or chasing the kids around the backyard, so get moving with these 5 ideas on how to be more active as a family:
1. Make a Game of It
Simply telling your kids to go outside and get some exercise is likely to be met with blank stares or cries of protest. But when you invite your kids to join you for a game of their choice, you put the ball in their court. There's a host of ways to make a game out of physical fitness:
- Beach volleyball
- Bowling
- Putt-putt
- Backyard soccer
- Wii games (baseball, bowling, etc.)
- Frisbee
- Charades (with active categories)
- Twister
- Jump-rope contests
- Push-up competitions
- Tag
