How to exercise with the kids at home during COVID-19 lockdown

The Coronavirus pandemic may have put a damper on your weekend aerobics classes, Zumba classes or trips to the gym, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get your fitness groove on.

Chinwe Obinwanne, a mom of three adorable kids and founder of Naijafitmoms Fitness Empire, shares how to exercise at home and even get the kids involved during the Covid-19 lockdown.

How To Exercise At Home With The Kids

We’ve been doing a lot of dancing with the kids, jumping ropes and engaging in various forms of fitness routines using bodyweight, equipment and sometimes fitness apps. You shouldn’t worry about space as long as you have just enough to turn around without hitting something and to do mat exercises easily.

Getting kids to adhere to a fitness routine requires patience and the willingness to have fun with the process. Here are some ideas you can try:

• Dance is an excellent form of exercise and you and the kids will enjoy it too, so put some music and move to the beats with the little ones.
• Depending on the ages of your kids, you could do the partner jump rope exercise we used to do as kids where two people swing and one person jumps. Trust me; you’ll have lots of fun and burn calories too.
• If you have a large space in your compound, do track races with the kids and reward the winner(s).
• Another fun thing to do is sack races if you have some sacks handy.
• You can also try shadowboxing. With shadowboxing, you can have the kids create imaginary villains while they are the superheroes who punch and defeat the villains. You can say let’s punch 150 times to defeat this villain and then you all begin and count down. It’s a good arm workout and if you do it with intensity, you should work up a good sweat too.

Exercises to increase couple bonding

• Couples can dance.
• Have a lot more sex (yeah, it’s also a physical activity).
• perform workout routines like squats, jumping jacks, partner plank hand taps, wall sits, push-ups and more together. Doing this will help motivate each other as well as strengthen the already existing bond.

Ideas on how to improvise when it comes to equipment

• For medium to light dumbbells, consider bottled water containers.
• If you want heavier dumbbells, consider sand-filled bottled water containers.
• Looking for extra weights for exercises like squats or deadlifts, consider empty 5-10 litre gallons filled with water.
• You also have school bags filled with books, small baskets filled with clothes and so much more, it depends on how creative you really want to be.

Health points to remember when exercising at home

When it comes to exercising, parents should be mindful of maintaining the perfect form when executing any routine as failure to do so could lead to injuries or sprains.

Also, it is imperative that parents listen to their bodies during any move and only go as far as your body permits.

Hydration is important during exercising, so keep water handy.

Do a warm-up before you begin any exercise routine and stretch the exercised muscles after every routine to eliminate muscle soreness.

This article was first published on AfricaParent.com