Movement, Homework, & Learning

Sometimes our plans just don't line up with our children's movement needs. 

Connell, Gill, and Cheryl McCarthy. A moving child is a learning child: how the body teaches the brain to think (Birth to age 7). Free Spirit Publishing, 2014.

Elementary & Middle School: A homework fight may mean they need more time to move. To help, they could: 

• Run and play first. 
• Try to stand up with a clipboard and do it.
• Sit on an exercise ball and bounce while they do it. 
• Lay on a yoga mat or blanket and do it. 
• Build a fort first and then do the work inside. 
• Bounce a basketball or throw a ball back and forth while practicing their spelling words or studying for a quiz.  
• Chunk the work. Do 1/2 of it before play and 1/2 of it after. 
• Do a math problem, do a physical activity, do another math problem, do another physical activity. 

Preschool: Learning should involve movement. If sitting still is necessary, make sure they get up and move before the activity and give movement breaks.

Here are some movement activities: 

• Explore and run around the back yard.
• Have a box full of magazines, toilet paper rolls, crayons, glue sticks, and paper they can use to make anything they want. 
• Jump the ABCs.
• Throw a ball when saying rhyming words. 
• Count while you hop. 
• Pretend you are characters from a story you read. 
• Just let them play independently.
• Join in their play. Only do what your child is doing. Don't try to improve upon their game or make any suggestions. 

Ultimately, movement helps our kids learn.