Whether your preschooler is reluctant to be active or is already busy playing soccer or riding a bike, encouraging your child to be physically active is a good thing, for many reasons!

This article discusses physical activity recommendations for preschoolers and also offers several ideas on how to support and encourage your preschooler to be active.

Young Kids Are Learning to Move
Generally, the reasons for being physically active are the same for kids as they are for adults. For instance, being active helps a person to move their muscles, become familiar with their body, boost their heart rate, and gain health benefits.

However, the difference with young kids is that they are in “learning and discovery” mode. During their preschool years, kids are constantly exploring and learning, including how to move their bodies or do all kinds of different physical activities.

In fact – as many parents, teachers or caregivers will attest – preschoolers often seem to go “non-stop” as they learn gross motor skills, such as jumping, running, rolling and throwing. 

Whether your child is a fast runner, dawdler, climber, flexible, or cautious, you can support and encourage their physical development and “physical literacy” as they grow and learn.

What is Physical Literacy?
Physical literacy is the understanding and confidence to move one’s body.  Canadian Sport for Life defines it as “the development of fundamental movement sport skills that permit a child to move confidently and with control in a wide range for physical activity, rhythmic (dance) and sport situations.”

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Children who have strong physical literacy are more likely to continue to be active as they grow up, and even into adulthood.  They are also more likely to learn to new physical activity skills easily. For example, if you never learned how to throw a ball when growing up, you may not feel very comfortable playing slow-pitch, football, or even Frisbee.

Learning basic physical literacy skills at a young age is very important for girls, as well as boys.  It has been shown that girls often don’t have strong physical literacy in teen or adult years, mostly due to a lack of participation in physical activity in their preschool or younger years.

Recommended Guidelines
In Canada, the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology is in the process of developing physical activity guidelines and sedentary behaviour guidelines for children aged 0-5 years. These guidelines are scheduled for release in Spring 2012.

In the United States, the National Association for Sport and Physical Education (NASPE) provides physical activity guidelines for the 0-5 age range. The NASPE guidelines recommend that preschoolers:

• Accumulate at least 60 minutes of structured physical activity each day.
• Engage in at least 60 minutes – and up to several hours – of unstructured physical activity each day, and should not be sedentary for more than 60 minutes at a time, except when sleeping.
• Be encouraged to develop competence in fundamental motor skills that will serve as the building blocks for future motor skillfulness and physical activity.

Expert Advice on Helping Preschoolers Move More
In general, there is wide agreement among the experts and leading organizations about key factors in getting preschoolers to be active. Here are some key points:

• Preschoolers are not going to be active like adults or even older children. Their physical activity should be very spontaneous, and intermittent. For instance, as an adult, you may like going for a long walk, but it’s quite likely your 4-year-old will quickly lose interest.
• The focus should be on gross motor skills (such as jumping or throwing) and learning to simply move around, such as walking, running or skipping. Many refer to these types of activities as fundamental movement skills.
• Preschoolers should take part in a wide variety of activities in order to help develop a large collection of fundamental skills. For instance, it’s great if your child learns to skate, but also aim to give them other opportunities to learn, such as how to kick or throw a ball, how to swim, or how to ride a bike.
• The activities your child does should be fun; and not a “required” task or action that they are forced to do.
• Adults who can safely model the skills and provide positive feedback may help the learning process and make it more enjoyable for the kids.
• Whenever possible, the activity should be outside so kids can explore nature, outdoor play spaces and equipment.

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Towards an Active Future
The preschool years are a great time for kids to be active, learn how to move their bodies, and develop active habits which can last a lifetime. Encourage your kids to move, and help them to reduce screen time or inactive time by setting limits and being a good role model.

The more your kids move, the more comfortable and confident they will be with their bodies. This will benefit them for the rest of their lives!

Remember, your child is just a learner, so they may be moving too fast or taking risks, or slowly or clumsily at times, depending on the activity. Be consistently patient, offer them guidance to be moving safely at all times, and just have fun watching your child learn and grow. It’s a good idea to provide lots of positive feedback, and whenever possible, model the movement or skill for them.

Keep the activities you do together as vigorous and enjoyable as possible; it could be as simple as an energetic game of tag! Have fun, and keep your child moving!

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Learn More
Active Play
A video from HEALTH Link Alberta (Health Unlimited Television). Click on the link and scroll down, the video is near the end of the page and is titled Active Play. Or, try this direct link.

Active for Life
This page shows you what skills kids learn at different ages, and provides ideas if your child is having difficulty with a skill.

Canadian Sport for Life: Active Start
A great website to help you learn more about movements and skills your preschool child needs to develop good physical literacy.

A Hop, Skip and a Jump: Enhancing Physical Literacy
Offers ideas for games and activities to help get preschoolers moving. (Note, this large document may take extra time to download.)

Active Start: A Statement of Physical Activity Guidelines for Children From Birth to Age 5
Published by the U.S. National Association for Sport and Physical Education

United Kingdom: Physical Activity Guidelines for Early Years (Under 5s) – For Children Who Are Capable of Walking