Easy Fitness Activities for Kids

Jumping jack flash is an easy fitness activity for kids that builds both muscle and cardiovascular strength. Want to build your biceps? Pump your pecs? Give your heart some heft? Check out jumping jack flash.

What You'll Need:

How to Play Jumping Jack Flash:Step 1: Start your exercise routine with five jumping jacks on your first fitness day. Mark it on your fitness chart.

Step 2: Add five more the second day. Mark that on your chart. Keep adding five until you can do 25 jumping jacks with ease.

Step 3: Now, add a second exercise (like toe touches) to your routine, starting with five repetitions. Mark that exercise on your chart.

Step 4: Keep increasing repetitions and adding exercises. Before you know it, you'll be buff as can be.

Get kids pumping iron without buying expensive exercise equipment. Read about the milk bottle workout on the next page.

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A milk bottle workout is a great way to get kids pumping iron without buying a lot of expensive equipment. Milk this activity for all the fitness you can!

What You'll Need:

How to Play Milk Bottle Workout:Step 1: Fill two one-quart plastic milk bottles with pebbles. How many times can you lift those milk bottles, one in each hand, over your head before your arms get tired?

Step 2: How many times can you touch the bottles together behind your back? In front of you? How many times can you touch your toes with the bottles?

Step 3: Try this game once a week and see if your numbers improve.

Help your kids improve flexibility and increase body awareness with happening joints. Read about this easy fitness activity on the next page.

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Happening joints is an easy fitness activity that develops kid's flexibility and promotes relaxation. Teach kids to celebrate the bends and bounces of their bodies!

Every joint in your body is a kind of engineering wonder, designed to make your body move in amazing ways. So why not celebrate every single bend?

How to Play Happening Joints:

Step 1: Move from the tips of your fingers to the tips of your toes, flexing each joint.

Step 2: Count how many joints you can move independently. Imagine what it would be like if that particular joint didn't exist.

Continue on to the next page for an easy fitness activity that gets kids outside and learning about the environment.

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Hike and hunt is an easy fitness activity that gets kids outside and keeps them occupied for hours. Teach kids to keep their eyes on the great outdoors!

What You'll Need:

How to Play Hike and Hunt:Step 1: The next time you take a hike in the woods or a nature area in your neighborhood, keep your eyes open for signs of wildlife. Are there bird feathers on the trail? Have local animals left tracks in the mud or sand? Are there bits of fur trapped in the bushes? What signs of nature can you find?

Step 2: What clues do those signs offer to the animals' ways of life? Use the magnifying glass for up-close looks at items that catch your eye. Make notes of your observations.

Step 3: Hike the same path a week later and make more observations. What has changed? What hasn't?

You can hike and observe regularly over a longer period, keep a nature journal, and learn something while you are exercising those legs!

Have fun and get fit with a Frisbee when you play frantic flying disk with your kids. Learn this easy fitness activity on the next page.

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Frantic flying disk is an easy fitness activity that will have your kids running around the yard for hours. Free your flying disk to sail to new heights!

What You'll Need:

Tossing a flying disk with a friend or a dog is a great way to keep fit -- and it's fun to do all by yourself also! And you can add a new challenge to the popular game.

How to Play Frantic Flying Disk:

Step 1: See how easy (or how hard) it is to send your flying disk sailing through a hula hoop from five paces away.

Step 2: Too easy? Move back 10 paces from the hoop. Still not tough enough? Try it from 16 paces away.

This game makes a great competition between friends or whole teams.

Help your kids develop coordination and speed with fast clap, a competitive fitness exercise on the next page.

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Fast clap is an easy fitness activity for kids that develops dexterity and quick reflexes. How fast can your kids clap their hands? It's not as easy as you think.

What You'll Need:

We often clap our hands together to express our approval -- to say we loved a musical show, to praise our favorite football players, to say we agree with something we've just heard.

But how fast can you clap your hands? And how do those numbers change with the position of your arms? Write down your numbers to find out.How to Play Fast Clap:

Step 1: Clap your hands in the usual position, right in front of your body, for 30 seconds. How many claps did you manage to make?

Step 2: Now do the same with your hands over your head. Now do the same with your hands behind your back. What muscles did you use when you clapped over your head that you didn't use clapping in front of you or clapping behind your back?

Ten-penny pickup helps kids develop dexterity and have fun at the same time. Get directions for ten-penny pickup on the next page.

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Ten-penny pickup is an easy fitness activity for kids that teaches them to use their toes in a whole new way. Once you toss these pennies, the race is on!

What You'll Need:

How to Play Ten-Penny Pickup:Step 1: Hold 10 pennies in your hand, and softly scatter them just a few feet in front of you. See how fast you can gather the pennies and drop them in the box or bowl. Write down your time.

Step 2: Now repeat the process. But this time, gather them with your toes before dropping them in the bowl or box. How long did that take?

Step 3: Want a few more choices? Try picking up the pennies with only your right hand. Now, only your left hand.

Step 4: Don't forget to wash your hands after you have finished playing. Coins are valuable, but they are not very clean!

For extra fun, invite a friend to play with you, and see who's the penny pickup champion.

See the next page for a game that gets kids active while they make important observations about their environment.

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Step by step is an easy fitness activity that teaches kids to actively observe their environment. Count on this step-by-step activity to be fun!

How to Play Step by Step:

Step 1: How many steps does it take to get from your room to your front door? How many steps to walk to school? How many steps to explore your local mall?

You've never thought about it, right? Well, slip on your thinking cap, and take it step by step. You might be amazed at how busy your feet actually are. Want an extra mind bender?

Step 2: Get an adult in your house to count his or her steps on the same routes you selected, then compare the numbers. Why are they different?

Hold a dance party for your kids! Find out how on the next page.

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Dance party is an easy fitness activity for kids that's both creative and fun. Let your kids dance to their favorite music, and see if you've got what it takes to shake it with your kids.

What You'll Need:

Music video dancers, dancers on Broadway in New York, ballet dancers, dancers of all kinds are incredible athletes. If you don't believe it, try this simple exercise on for size.

How to Play Dance Party:Step 1: Make a mix of your favorite songs or wait for one you like to come on the radio. Begin to dance nonstop to the beat of the tune. Lift your legs, swing your arms, leap and twirl in the air. It doesn't really matter what you do, so long as you keep your body in constant motion for the entire length of the song.

Step 2: When the song ends, how does your body feel? How are your lungs feeling? Is your heart pumping at a rapid pace? Why do you think that's so?

Now imagine dancing like that in a 50-minute ballet. You'll have a newfound respect for the professional dancers you love to watch on TV!

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