A Summary of the Article: "For More Active Kids, Forget Exercise; Have Fun Instead!"

In the quest to squelch childhood obesity, or just obesity in general, the two main factors are healthy eating and excersise. I believe the hardest part of this for a child is the exercise, simply because you don't want to bore them with repetetive workouts. The parent must not only give the child fun activity choises, but they also should not allow to exercise to revolve around calorie counting. That is the reason I chose to summarize this particular article.
In this article, author Catherine Holecko outlines how to positively insert exercise into the lives of children. She sets up two main topics: how parents can encourage active kids and avoidable mistakes that discourage active kids.

 To encourage active kids Holecko suggests parents set a good example, enjoy exercise, play together, praise effort rather than results, offer positive reinforcement and to ask your child to teach you something. To set a good example you must "walk the walk," as well as "talk the talk." This shows your children that being active is actually important. Not only should you encourage exercise, but you should enjoy it! Ms. Holecko recommends talking to your child about how you feel after exercising. Playing together also sets a good example for your child and reminds him/her how much you love them. Of course, we can't perfect an activity in one try, so Holecko also encourages parents to praise their childs effort rather than their final results. Parents should also praise a childs good decisions and healthy choice. Praise will make them want to remain active. Also, asking a child to teach you something they're very good at tells them how interested you are and how proud you are of them.

In the next section, the author describes how to avoid discouraging mistakes such as using exercise as a punishment, offering food as a reward, and using scare tactics. These are all very common mistakes that can easily be avoided. By using exercise as a punishment, Holecko explains how kids begin associating being active with chastisement, which is not healthy. Also, when a parent rewards good acts with food, they are telling their child that it is okay to eat unhealthy and that it's okay to eat when you're not particularly hungry. This reward system starts out very unhealthy eating habits at an early age. Catherine Holecko illustrates replacing scare tactics with positive reinforcement by saying, "Riding your bike helps make your heart and legs strong," rather than, "If you watch too much TV, you'll get fat and sick." Although the latter may be true, your statement would be more effective if it were positively put.
In conclusion, kids are sensitive human beings who need to have fun. In order to encourage active children, it would be a good idea to follow these guidelines set out by Catherine Holecko in her article, "For More Active Kids, Forget Exercise; Have Fun Instead!"

                                                            Works Cited

Holecko, Catherine. "Active Kids - Help Kids Have Fun With Fitness and Physical Activity." Family Fitness. Web. 23 Jan. 2011. http://familyfitness.about.com/od/motivation/a/fitness_fun.htm.

 

 

 

Two other helpful websites:

 

http://www.letsmove.gov/

 

http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/childhood/index.html