By Kim Sulman

As a physical education teacher, what I hope to encourage in my students is a lifetime commitment to health. That could mean anything from competitive athletics to walking a dog each day; what matters most is making it appealing. The students I teach at Carolina Friends School range from elementary to high school. They aren’t motivated by things such as disease prevention or health benefits. They aren’t even interested in the word exercise. They want to do things that help them feel successful and confident—and they want to have fun. 

Our dream as a physical education department is to have our students choose to move and be physically active for life. You never want to tell a child to exercise in order to lose weight. You have to find fun activities that they want to do, for 30-60 minutes a day. 

I’ve seen a lot of parents become very anxious over how to get their children to move more, and the best advice I can give is to do it together and to make it silly. It starts in the home, in the family room or the backyard. Modeling that behavior for your children and celebrating real effort are the most important steps you can take. You don’t have to be good at it either; show them that it’s ok to not be good at something “yet” and that with effort you will all gain new skills along the way. Here are some easy ways to get started:

• Buy, build, or find a wide range of toys and equipment, and allow for creativity. One of the most popular activities we do with our students, across ages, is building creative obstacle courses, indoors or out. You can throw pillows and cushions on the floor for a family round of “floor is lava.” Kids love to make up games. 
• Get silly with them! If you want your child to love moving their bodies, join them in making it fun. Sometimes we adults forget what it’s like to get on the ground or just be goofy. Even if you’re managing hectic schedules, 30 minutes spent together in physical play is guaranteed to make you more productive, and everyone happier.
• Give your kids voice and choice. Even with traditional sports equipment, they will find new ways to use them that keeps them engaged—encourage it! We use the flying disk game, Kan Jam, in our classes. They work in pairs and try to hit a can with a frisbee. Some can manage to do this pretty well, but others can’t. It’s okay if they decide to do something else creative with those things, as long as they’re moving around.
• Go for walks in nature. If it helps, you can schedule time to walk in your daily routine, or you can make the walk more exciting by visiting a park, trail, or playground. Utilize your community spaces!
• If the weather prevents you from going outside, find ways to turn your house into a playground. Rolled up socks in a laundry basket can be used for snowball fights. Wear socks on smooth floors and pretend to ice skate. Take turns standing in place and finding elaborate ways to throw soft foam balls at each other. I once wrapped my kids’ feet in rags and squirted floor cleaner down. Did the floors get really clean? Maybe not. But they still remember how fun it was!
• Encourage healthy risk taking. Let your child attempt new skills by themselves. If they want to cross the monkey bars, don’t lift them up. Allow them the chance to figure out what they can do on their own. Identify safe spaces where they can test their strengths and ability to solve problems. You can learn so much by observing how your children tackle these challenges. Taking healthy risks is an important part of building both muscles and esteem.

Variety is more important than specialization. Once your child is ready for organized sports, let them choose a variety of activities to try. Specializing at a young age doesn’t prepare them if they decide they don’t want to do that one activity anymore. Try indoor and outdoor, team and individual. This will build confidence, camaraderie, build skills in all planes of motion, teach them strategy, and more than anything, show the impact of resilience and effort. They’ll learn how to manage winning as well as losing in a way that helps them grow as a human.