Heading out on a “hike” to North Park Nature Village, Botanical Garden, or Morton Arb (our favorite is to drive around and find all the trolls by parking and walking to them)
Follow the leader outside or inside, stationary or on a path walking
Touch a spot (touch 3 spots in your play area/ house and time each child to see if they can beat their own time)
Mirror (stand facing another person and do everything they’re doing but as if you’re looking in a mirror)
Take a Skip & Scoot class!! (Shameless plug!) =)
Wheelbarrow (the younger the child, hold closer to the hips), bear crawl, or crab walk tag, races, or collecting items around the play area to put in a bucket
Indoors obstacle course (pillows, blankets, pot holders, painters tape, chairs, etc use your imagination)
Dance party, dance show (make up a show to perform to the adults), air band music perforance
Animal Charades
Red light, green light (add more lights and make up your own movements- e.g. purple light means go backwards)
Altitude trampoline park
Outdoors pathway practice (take turns making pathways through the obstacles around you- “go around the tree, under the bike rack, touch the fence, hop to the bench, and back to start”
Opposite day game: everything you say to do, the child does the opposite (reach up high/ they reach down low, move forward/ they move backward, etc.)
Find obstacles in nature (log for a balance beam, rocks for balance buckets, low branches for tunnel crawling, etc.)
Frozen tag: find something red and something blue (pool noodle, ball, bean bag, hat, etc.) the person holding the blue thing is Elsa and freezes people, the person holding the red thing performs an act of true love to unfreeze the person. Switch roles.
Upside-down (practice going upside down by lying on back and lifting feet into the air, try a bicycle, make a V with legs, scissor your legs, kick like you’re swimming, flex and point feet, make your legs dance to music, etc.)
Cardio triangle challenge: 5-4-3-2-1 perform 3 activities in repetitions of 5-4-3-2-1. (Say you choose jumping jacks, bunny hops, and lunges. First start with 5 of each, then decrease by one from there.)
Backwards: tell your child that everywhere they go for the next 15 minutes, they need to turn around and get there backwards or sideways.
Messy room: get pompoms, crumpled paper, small balls, etc. divide your play area in two with a line down the middle (can use a blanket). Have children try to throw all of the objects onto the other side of the line to keep their room clean for 60 seconds. Then hvae them count to see who has less. Do multiple rounds.
Plank, wall-sit, or burpee contest!
We’d love to hear from you about your favorite ways to stay active! Drop them in the comments below!