Forming Healthy Habits in Youth: 5 Family Fitness and Wellness Habits to Start NOW

Every year, the second Saturday in June is Family Health and Fitness Day. This special day promotes the importance of keeping communities healthy and active - something that Edington Family Fitness is passionate about. Developing healthy habits in youth is so important. It’s the very reason Edington Family Fitness was created. 

It’s very hard to reverse poor habits, so teaching healthy eating and physical fitness right out of the gate is the best way to positively impact your child’s physical well-being for life. According to the World Health Organization, 340 million adolescents and 39 million children are obese. Childhood obesity is a very real worldwide problem. As parents and caregivers, we have the power to change that. Family fitness and wellness through virtual fitness and online workouts can positively influence your children to form healthy habits from a young age. 

“Many skills both physically and cognitively are developed by age 5,” says Shellie Edington, Founder, and Owner of Edington Family Fitness. “By being active and exposing children to a multitude of physical activities, and by setting the example that moving your body and healthy food is very important starts kids on the right track to develop healthy habits.”

Keep reading for our tips to help your child form healthy habits now that will serve them throughout their life. 

Make Fitness A Family Affair

Kids learn so many habits just from watching their parents. “Parents need to have healthy habits,” Edington says. Coordinate family fitness and wellness activities daily and include the kids in planning them. “Expose children to a multitude of physical activities and help your child love nature and exploring by cultivating a sense of adventure through hiking, bike riding, and swimming,” Edington says. “The local parks and recreation departments are usually a great resource.” Let your child take the lead often and decide what family fitness activity to do for the day. Offer a range of choices from virtual fitness or online workouts to a family bike ride or hike, letting them have a say in what you do as a family. 

Encourage Movement. 

There are plenty of ways to encourage daily movement. There are many programs starting in the toddler years that encourage athletic development and in the school-age years encouraging kids to join a sports team is a great way to instill the fitness habit. But if your child doesn’t want to play a sport, don’t force it. Setting the example by moving daily yourself or incorporating family fitness into your daily routine can go a long way in helping your child form the fitness habit. Edington Family Fitness offers the best of both worlds, including virtual fitness classes for adults and online workouts for two youth age groups - 4 to 6 and 7 to 10. 

Stay Positive. 

When forming the family fitness and wellness habit in youth, you want to take care to keep it light and positive. Don’t ever force physical activity or use it as a punishment. Keep it fun, avoid getting highly competitive, and don’t force a sport if your kid just isn’t into it. Instead, let your child know they are part of the family team and that family fitness and wellness is a group effort.

Offer a Range of Healthy Choices. 

The second part of instilling healthy habits in youth is teaching kids to make healthy food choices from a young age. As parents and caregivers, you have all the control here. For starters, make sure you are setting aside time for meals. Don’t teach standing and grazing as a meal. Offer a variety of healthy choices at each meal and enlist your child’s help picking foods, shopping for, and prepping meals. Don’t be offended if your child tries something and doesn’t like it. Remember, it takes multiple exposures to a specific food for a child to try it and numerous tries to decide if they like it. Stay positive and give it some time before offering the food again at a different meal.  

Don’t Use Food as Reward or Punishment. 

One rule of thumb for family fitness and wellness is that food is fuel for your body, and the better you fuel your body, the better it will perform. You should not use food as a punishment - or make your child sit at the table until their plate is clean. This teaches them to ignore their body’s cues that tell them when they are full. You want them to always listen to their body. On the flip side, don’t reward them with food. Don’t offer ice cream after a test, and don’t give sweet treats for potty training. Food is food. It should be neutral and looked at as simply something our body needs to operate at its best.  

Edington Family Fitness programming provides an efficient total body workout through functional virtual fitness that combines strength development and high-intensity intervals. Coach Shellie is a professional athlete and certified trainer with a passion for helping people become the best version of themselves. Edington Family Fitness delivers online workouts to you and the whole family that can be done anywhere.