This is a brilliant saying from Nilofer Merchant’s Huffington Post article Huffington Post article  and corresponding  TED talk .  As a pediatric physical therapist and movement advocate, I fully agree.

What can we do as parents?

• Limit your screens!  Turn those things off and get moving instead!  National Screen Free Week is May 4th – May 10th!  I urge you to participate in this starting on Monday  if your family is not already screen free.  Here is their Facebook page:  https://www.facebook.com/screenfreeweek  Go and check it out!

Here are the tips for screen free week.

Here is a list of 101 Screen Free Activities  Activity is the font of life!

Keep moving!  Here are a few more ideas:

• Stop sitting so much ourselves.  Cooking, cleaning, gardening, active pursuits all count. Choose walks in the morning and afternoon, less time in a car overall.   Show our children we can DO.  Be the role model!
• Plan time to get outside every day.  Look for playing and meeting other parents in streams, creeks, large expansive meadows, hiking trails and beaches.  Get children on their bikes (many children CAN learn to ride a bike with no training wheels by 3 and a half if they practice and use a balance bike first!).  Swim, pick berries, walk.
• If you live in a neighborhood, let your children play outside with other children.  Talk to the other parents in your neighborhood!  Yes, even if you have to put dinner in a crock pot and stand there outside with them all and yes, even if you have to show grades-aged children how to play kickball or freeze tag.  Don’t laugh; I have met children that had no idea how to play either or these games.  Pull out jump ropes and help them draw hopscotch. 
• If you are homeschooling, schedule in ACTIVE time.  Not just active movement in the “warm-up” part of the day, but during the main lesson itself.  Can you also plan a very active outing each week in addition to being outside each day as well?  Can you kayak, canoe, snowshoe, ski, hike, snorkel one full morning or afternoon a week?

Share your ideas for cutting out or down media and staying active with children in the comment box or on The Parenting Passageway Facebook page!

Blessings,

Carrie