Photo by: Mike Baird

Cure Your Little Couch Potato!

Photo by: Mike Baird

It’s hard to compete with TV, computers, and video games, but there is a way to weave cardio workouts, strength training, and flexibility exercises into your children’s everyday routines–without them even realizing it!

I came to the obvious conclusion that my kids, and kids everywhere, needed more movement. Sure, kids were now eating better, but there was a crucial piece lacking: eating better without enough exercise (read: “play”) was like the sound of one hand clapping. Everyone knows that exercise and good food work together, but it took a while for it to dawn on me that I could apply methods to kids’ exercise, simply by disguising it as play.

Study after study is showing that today’s kids are less and less active and, further, that watching TV substantially shortens life span. People who watch more than 4 hours a day have an 80% higher risk of dying from heart disease and a 46% higher risk of all causes of death compared with those who watch less than 2 hours a day (even after adjusting for all other factors).

Researchers have also learned that exercise does not have to be highly aerobic or prolonged to have a positive effect. In another study, it was found that children who exercised moderately for short periods of time during the day enjoyed the same health benefits as those who were on athletic teams. These researchers concluded that children should be encouraged to play and move their bodies throughout the day, not just in intense workouts all at once.

The challenge, of course, is that our kids are more hooked on sedentary pastimes than ever before. TV, computers, cell phones, and video games…our young ones literally don’t have to lift a finger to find entertainment! Coupled with this is the fact that many schools are cutting down on recess and physical education, and neighborhoods are no longer places where kids hang out and play. This lack of motion is taking a toll on our children’s well-being, and parents, after a day of work, come home too tired to think of what to do about the problem.

As luck would have it, while I was succeeding at getting my kids to eat healthier but failing to get them off the couch, one of the leading kids fitness experts, Larysa Didio, was having just the opposite problem: she was successfully applying some sneaky methods to getting kids to move more but failing to get them to eat healthier! It was a match made in heaven.

In our book, Sneaky Fitness, we joined forces to create over 100 ways for kids to simply have fun while getting fit. These playful activities can be “snuck” into any child’s day in a delightful way. They are tried and true fun and games that will become family favorites. And

  • As you unpack groceries, let toddlers “set up shop” stacking, “selling” and bagging up canned goods for a good workout with lots of interesting role playing.
  • Grade school aged kids will get a literal kick putting on half time shows for the family.
  • Got a tween who texts incessantly? Make it a rule that they have to walk around the house while talking and texting. They’ll end up walking for an hour or more! Compare that to lying on a couch for the same amount of time.
  • Watching too much TV? See all sorts of fun things to do during commercials!

Also in Sneaky Fitness, I’ve created 50 brand new recipes that will get your little couch potato sprinting to the table for meals and snacks. While you give them what they love—like Honey BBQ Chicken Nuggets, Chocolate Champion Cereal Cookies, Mac n’ Cheese Pizza and many, many more—you’ll be happy knowing that hidden in each kid-pleasing dish are veggies and fruits such as blueberries, spinach, cauliflower, zucchini, yams, carrots, whole grains and much more.

The proof, as they say, is in the pudding. Kids love this food because it tastes great. Parents love the sneaky super nutrients that are so important to a child’s health and development. Similarly, kids engaged in activities are only aware of one thing: fun! You don’t have to tell them that they’re working on their motor skills, strength, and agility. It all happens naturally.

Now is the time to get your child off that couch and into gear!

Missy Chase Lapine, created the “Sneaky Fitness” series of books; the latest addition is “Sneaky Fitness: Fun, Foolproof Ways to Slip Fitness into Your Child’s Everyday Life, and It’s been called a “revolutionary” way for moms and dads to improve their family’s health because it makes exercise fun again. Missy is the former publisher of Eating Well magazine and the founder of the natural baby product line, BabySpa. She has been a cooking instructor at New York’s finest culinary schools, and also serves on the Children’s Advisory Council of Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital of New York-Presbyterian where Sneaky Chef recipes are served to patients. Sneaky Chef exclusive prepared foods are also featured and sold at Whole Foods Market.

Editor’s Note This post was sponsored to promote the newest Sneaky Fitness book.

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8 Comments

This article rocks! I am going to check this book out and get back to ya...I have a toddler who watches TV - mostly DVDs or DVR and refuses to sit down...is that a good thing?

i always just had my kids playing outside-very seldom were they a couch potato..just didnt allow it-they ate good,played hard,helped with chores,i think its all in how you start training them at a very early age.my kids are 27&28 an still very active-even at 50 below-they are out an about,ice fishing,sledding,snowmobiling etc.it all starts at the very beginning....

These are good ideas, but why are kids sitting on the couch for four hours at a time?

Parents can -- and should -- set limits on screen time from the start. My children get half an hour each weekday, and two and a half hours for the weekend, making a measly five hours per week of computer, videogames, or tv. They also are active in sports, and we've had no trouble with them not getting enough exercise.

I love this idea!! I find it becomes more difficult in the colder season when my son can't be outside. I limit TV time, but he has recently been introduced to Xbox... so now I have to limit that. My son is physically fit but I do see this epidemic of overweight kids and think this is a great way to encourage movement into a child's (and adults) life!

Good points and here are some other related ideas for routines for children
http://blogs.goddardsystems.com/Cedar-Park-TX/2009/10/30/...

The way we "cured" the couch potato problem with our four children was to NOT even own a tv. :-) It works! Then they needed to go out and play or figure out creative ways to play indoors when the weather didn't permit. We didn't even get a computer until they were all in Middle and/or High School when they actually needed a computer for school. Didn't allow computer use (unless it was strictly for school work) until everything else was done...

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A friend of mine attended your seminar in HK and bought 2 sets of the star/reward system which she can hang up on the wall. She raved abt how effective the system is and i would like to buy a set for my son.

could you pls kindly tell me how i can purchase that.

Many thanks

I am blessed to have been too poor to have a TV growing up--so I missed the MTV culture, the sappy dumb 80's flicks, atari computers and pacman games. To this day find TV totally unnecessary and i'm really really bad at video games. My husband is a movie fanatic but nothing else is interesting to him so we have a movie screen ($30 brand new at goodwill!!) and a projector. The kids watch a movie with us at night sometimes after chores and that's it. I hate TV programs so I guess I'm the TV Nazi...

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