Parents spend a lot of time worrying about their children’s health and well-being. This isn’t particularly surprising, as all good parents want the best for their children. What is surprising however, is how little parents are doing about it. The Telegraph states that children are spending less time outside than ever, in fact it averages less than 30 minutes a week outside. The article goes on to say that parents admit to not taking their children on outdoor activities such as fishing or star gazing and even goes as far to suggest that children are losing their sense of adventure.
Time
One way to combat this is to devote more time to be spent as a family. Let’s be honest, finding a substantial amount of time to spend doing activities with your children isn’t always easy.
Hardworking parents have less free time these days. Spending just an hour doing something together as a family could bring back huge health benefits for your children and yourself.
Applied Sport Psych believes that outdoors family activities are important for shaping children’s ideas and development. They also state that it encourages teamwork and critical thinking.
Family Activities
The best way to get your children interested in family time is to make it an event. For example if you are going on a long bike ride as a family at the weekend then build up to it during the week. This will help get your children excited especially if it is something you haven’t done before.
The health benefits don’t just apply to outdoor activities. All family time is good for your children. Real Simple made a list of eleven unusual activities parents can do with their children. What the list emphasizes is that something as simple as creating a time capsule or cooking is a great way to engage with your children.
A Tootsa blog post on creative crafts for children states that boys and girls should share the same activities at a young age. The post goes on to argue that manufacturers reinforce stereotypes on children such as boys should play football and girls should do creative things like sowing. By not restricting your children by what is considered to be their gender activity this straight away narrows your child’s creative and active choices.
When children are very young, they play together doing the same activities. This should continue throughout their childhood and can only be encouraged by the parents. For example, a family could one day do some sewing or an activity that is stereotypically considered female and the next play sport together like football. Both activities will positively affect your children without having to worry about gender.
Let’s face it when we aren’t spending time with them our children are often in front of a screen. For many parents getting their children away from the television or computer can be hard. One way to combat this is to join in with them while they watch a program or play a computer game. Even though it might not sound like it is helping be sure to know that it is creating a stronger bond with the child. Whatever family time you spend will increase your children’s health.
