Raising Our Kids With Exercise
I’m pretty active, and always have been. I grew up playing mostly soccer and swimming, but also did baseball, basketball, cross country, track, and even tried my hand at football. When I wasn’t at formal practice, you could usually find me in any one of our neighbors’ yards playing sports, kick the can, ghosts in the graveyard, etc. That’s just how all of us were 15-20 years ago. Apparently today is different. Kids just aren’t getting the same exercise that they used to when I (we) was (were) growing up.
Here’s some evidence of that last statement from MSNBC.
I know I’m going to have kids in the future. I like to think I have too good of genes not to reproduce. (my attempt at comedic relief) Recently, I was with my best friend and her husband at a shopping mall and we were talking about the birth of their first child this coming March. Somehow we got to the topic of what we thought the child’s interests may be, whether it’s art, music, numbers, sports, etc. We came to a simple conclusion about how we’d each raise our children and it boils down to one statement.
“My kids can do whatever they want, or be interested in whatever they like, as soon as they get home from swim practice and soccer practice.”
We think that exercise, fitness, competing, and general sports are too important. We think that if we show them early on that this is just a regular part of life then it will be generally accepted by them as second nature. All three of us grew up playing soccer and swimming, among other things, and truly believe that those experiences shaped us better than anything else we could have done with our time.
What are your thoughts? What about the article’s findings? How can we be better?