The Youth Fitness Difference

Posted on: June 27th, 2010 by IYCA 10 Comments

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Youth Fitness

“Fitness” in Early Childhood: Part I

This article is Part I of a series by Dr. Kwame M Brown. There will be more to come, including details about programming and resources for our members.

I spend all day around preschoolers and parents. We have a great preschool here at Lee District RECenter in Franconia, VA and the teachers here are all about play! I don’t regularly work formally with the preschool children, but interact with them and play little games with them throughout the day as they bang on my window, or I see them in the hall, or play hopscotch with them on the sidewalk outside. Our teachers are wonderful all by themselves and don’t really need me that much.

I am often asked how to do fitness programs for kids at this age. The answer I often give is that the programming is easy: Combine outdoor play (mostly) lots of pretend play and obstacle courses. For older toddlers, you can begin adding simple tag games, crawling or hopping relays, and very simple throw, catch and kick games. There are tons of great activities available on the web for this age group.

The hard part: the teaching!

With this group you have to be in equal parts:

Understanding
Engaged / Energetic
Patient
Creative
Silly
Uninhibited
Authoritative (for safety only)

Running a fitness program for older children and teens is as much or slightly more about the personnel as the program. Running youth fitness programs for the preschool age is overwhelmingly about the personnel more than the program.

If you consider yourself a fitness professional, or a highly qualified coach, you may not be successful in running preschool program. If you, on the other hand, consider yourself a play partner, you can be incredibly successful. Kids will ask when they will see you again. My assistant and I have kids who run and jump into our arms when we see them! They know that we are having fun being with them. They know that we’re not there to get performance out of them, but to enjoy their play experiences alongside them.

Learn to Train Kids from 6 – 18 (Athletes & Non-Athletes Alike)…

…with the Youth Fitness Specialist – Level 1 certification

Childhood Obesity: The Threat To Youth Fitness

Posted on: October 28th, 2009 by IYCA 21 Comments

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Childhood Obesity

Liz D:

I’ve posted a question on a local moms forum asking what parents think are the root causes of Childhood Obesity/inactivity.

Certainly the typical ideas came forth: too much fast food, lack of exercise, not getting kids engaged in good habits early.

One idea did strike me and I’ve heard other moms tell me this. Heck, I even live this circumstance now:

One serious threat to youth activity is the lack of safety in our neighborhoods. We have so much access to information that we know when a sex offender moves into the ‘hood. We also hear about creeps on the news and evildoers who have even taken a child, hand-in-hand away from her backyard to bring her off premises.

With all this scary stuff afoot, moms and dads are definitely afraid to give their young kids especially too much liberty outside.

Has anyone ever polled parents to see if this comes up? Heck, for you IYCA parents out there, is this a factor in your life? Is organized sports the only recourse people see? Is there a solution to this or at least a good rib-tickling one-liner I can give these people? (Just goofing there)

Please chime in on your ideas.

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