
Motivating Children/Teens to Exercise
Intrinsic motivation is something that develops over time. Kids don’t yet have the cognitive abilities to grasp the concept that, “exercising is good for physical and mental health.” The understanding that by “doing something good for your body now, your future self will thank you,” is far too abstract. Kids don’t live for the future, they live for the here and now.
By the time children are in high school and/or go through puberty, those high order thinking cognitive processes begin to develop. However, social obligations and a sense of figuring out one’s own identify often trump the desire to be consistently active for one’s own physical and/or mental health purposes.
Sports certainly help, as they play a role in encouraging healthy competitiveness within oneself and others, as well as promotes team building and social opportunities that child and young adults actively seek out. However, not every kid plays a sport or has the health opportunities to actively participate in one. So, how do we encourage motivating?
There are two types of motivation: intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. Some will say, intrinsic motivation is ideal because it creates long lasting effects on one’s drive and purpose to reach a goal. The definition of intrinsic motivation is, “behavior that is driven by internal rewards.” Extrinsic motivation is the opposite. Extrinsic motivation is defined as, “behavior that is motivated to perform an activity to receive an award or avoid punishment.”
When starting to increase your child’s motivation to exercise, extrinsic motivation is the “easiest” way to go. When young, a child/teen is beginning to develop his/her own sense of motivation and enjoyment from exercising, something that is not going to happen overnight. Fortunately, exercising regularly will naturally contribute to developing intrinsic motivation, as it increases the feel-good happy chemicals in your brain (serotonin, dopamine, endorphins). But, habits do take time, so here are three tips to increase your child’s motivation to exercise!
- Reward System
There are often mixed reactions to implementing a reward system. However, a reward system is not something to frown about when working on establishing a foundation for positive behaviors. Research has shown that children respond better to positive reinforcements than they do to negative reinforcements.
How to begin a behavior reinforcement plan:
- For children ages 7-12: Make a personalized goal tracker with your child. For example, if want your kid to do something physically active 3x a week, create a page with three boxes per week to check off after each workout (e.g., can use stickers, a drawing, a penny, etc.)
- For children 13 and older: they can often keep rack on their own, and independence is key for teenagers and young adults.
- Each workout = 1 point.
- It is up to you to decide how often a reward occurs and what the reward will be.
- Reward types: with your child’s help, create a list of 5 items/things that might be motivating to earn. For example, 30 minutes of a favorite show, a new toy or “surprise box,” staying up later one night a week, choice of a favorite meal for dinner, a new book, etc. The possibilities are endless!
- Each workout = 1 point.
- Social Opportunity
As an adult, performing 15 reps, 4x on one exercise is manageable. Our attention is longer. We enjoy isolation more. We have intrinsic motivation or tangible goals set for ourselves, like losing weight. However, children and young adults are heavily socially dependent with shorter attention spans. Their worlds thrive around social opportunities, So, make physical exercise a social experience. Workout with your child, put on a YouTube video and together and complete 30 minutes. Put on your child’s favorite music on in the background and encourage your child to work out for 20 minutes (set a timer). One time a week (or more) invite a friend or sibling, make it an event that can be done inside or outside, and make it fun.
- Bring back Play
Which brings us to our third tip: Bring back play! Even if you have a teenager or young adult, play is important to developing a positive attitude towards physical exercise. Play can consist of hiking with friends or family, trying a new activity in your community, and generally, reducing the strict structure around exercise that children and young adults often try to escape as they build independence and autonomy. A majority of the time, exercising can consist of structured exercises catered around a specific goal, however, a few times a month it’s important to switch it up and encourage exploring of physical exercise through unstructured (play) opportunities.
More From THE Blog
Improving Lung Function Through Strength Training
The diaphragm is an essential skeletal muscle that is chronically active and is among the most aerobically adapted muscles (Ottenheijm et al., 2008). During inspiration, the diaphragm and external intercostal muscles contract, causing the rib cage to expand, moving...
High Intensity Interval Training: Thinking Beyond Speed
Training in short bouts with limited recovery between exercises has shown to produce positive net gains to improvement in overall exercise capacity. The harder you work and the less recovery you have between sets, creates a formula that will push the limits of the...
Muscle Soreness Doesn’t Predict Future Muscle Strength
Exercise training can cause soreness to the muscles, especially when you partake in strenuous exercise. The feeling of muscle soreness that you get when we roll out of bed, can often bring a sense of accomplishment. The muscles were pushed to their...
Stay Away From Foggy Goals
The journey to finding the best training method or philosophy, without first clearly establishing your goal, has the potential to lead to a lifetime of shortcomings. One of the most important you can ever accomplish is clearly defining a measurable and concise goal....
Breaking the Pattern
Human beings are routine and patterned based species. We like things that are predictable and stable. This is because the more routine-based our lives our, the less cognitive activity it takes to complete a task and we preserve more energy as a result. This natural...
The Importance of Key Receptors in the Control of Breathing During Exercise
The primary function of the respiratory system is to provide gas exchange between the atmosphere and cells within the body. This occurs in four continuous and concurrent processes. The first process is pulmonary respiration (ventilation). Pulmonary...
Building Your Cores Foundation is Essential in Pulmonary Conditions
During the inspiration of air, the thoracic cavity expands and there is a decrease in the intrapleural pressure around the lungs in order to allow the lungs to expand. As the lungs expand, the diaphragm contracts, due to the increased transabdominal pressure and...
Neuromuscular Strength in Pulmonary Conditions
There is no mystical aura that engulfs the gym that gives individuals the gift of brute strength, or gives individual’s cardiovascular capacity like Secretariat, the triple crown record-breaking stallion at Belmont Stakes. There are numerous variables that...
Building the Armor: Sit-Ups May Not Be the Answer
Sit-ups and crunches have been the staple-mark core exercises used to build core strength and endurance. They are easy to implement; you don’t need equipment or a lot of space to perform them. But, are they really the most efficient exercises to target core...
Pulmonary Exercise Testing Should Be Goal Oriented
Performance testing can take on many different looks depending on what you are wanting to measure. For example, if you are looking to improve cardiorespiratory efficiency, VO2max testing is typically used. If you are looking to measure speed, you may use a...
Your Exercise Training Should Fit Your Goal
There are many approaches to exercise.; a buffet of options to pick from these days. You have the option of focusing on mobility and range of motion by participating in yoga classes. You can test your exercise capacity by joining a cycling class or by...
High-Intensity Interval Training: Is It Really Worth It?
It was about a year ago when I watched an exercise video a colleague had sent me. The fitness enthusiast filmed a HIIT training workout for their followers. The workout consisted of various lower body weight plyometric based exercises. It had only been a...
The Importance of Cardiopulmonary Testing in Pulmonary Diseases
The primary aim of exercising is to improve quality of life, strength, endurance, and/or movement capabilities. Integrating a resistance and cardiovascular training program into a client’s lifestyle can improve posture, respiration, musculoskeletal strength...
Tips to Build Home Exercise Equipment and Workouts
There has been a flood of exercise content these last few weeks. It is great to see trainers, coaches, and experts in the field of science giving back to the community. There are many ways to exercise and we have seen many different approaches to training. We believe...
Motivating Youth to Workout at Home
Let’s be honest. Motivating youth to do workouts after school or on the weekends can be hard enough, and now not only are doing their workouts at home, but they are also taking their classes online at home! With so much times at home, how do you keep your...
Protect Your Vocal Folds: The Little Muscles That Give you a Voice!
As a Speech Language Pathologist, I have been curious about the impact’s cystic fibrosis, COPD, and other respiratory illnesses have on vocal quality. Having been around the CF community for a couple of years, I know that CF can impact numerous organ systems that...
Cystic Fibrosis at the Playground
Your child has a right to be a kid! Of course, having a child with cystic fibrosis brings on more challenges and worries. It requires being more alert to surroundings, your child, and others. But, your child still deserves to play and you still deserve to watch your...
Complementary Approaches to Clearing Mucus
The clearance of mucus is very important for individuals fighting pulmonary conditions. In cystic fibrosis (CF) and COPD the clearance of mucus is crucial to clearing bacteria pathogens to reduce the decline in lung function. To understand how we can attack the...
Reduce Your Stress By Scheduling Your Workouts Through A Bigger Lens
One of the ways people measure their success in the gym each week is by counting how many times they showed up to the gym. For example, 5 days in the gym equals 5 workouts. That is assuming you are only working out once a day. When planning out our weekly schedule,...
Are You Apart of the Morning Crew or Night Crew?
Exercising is important for everyone. Exercising has many benefits from improving cardiovascular health, decreasing stress, to even improving lung function in cystic fibrosis and COPD. However, what is good for us doesn’t mean we will always want to partake in...
Optimizing Recovery for CF and COPD
The body is a remarkable system that takes time to recover. When you have chronic illness, such as CF or COPD, the recovery time the body needs will be a little different than for a healthier individual. This is due to decreased oxygen consumption and...
3-Tips to Programming Strength Training
Strength training can be a powerful tool to daily living. Strength training helps improve respiratory function, muscular strength and endurance and it supports your ability to live with using less effort. The musculoskeletal system moves the body’s joints so that you...