Balance Exercises for Children to Maximize Performance

July 3, 2018

While placing your child on a balance beam right away may be a little extreme, it’s always good to encourage your child to try new activities — especially ones that develop balance and coordination skills.

Not only does having good balance affect your performance in sports, improving these essential skills also contributes to reduced risks of injury, enhanced performance on the field and added strength while engaging in day-to-day activities.

Added benefits of improved balance include:

Self-confidence and self-esteem boost
Increased sports performance
Reduced risks of injury
Increased interest in participating in sports
Increased social interactions due to involvement in sports teams
Improved teamworking skills

Whether your child is participating at a sporting event in school or has taken an interest in skipping everywhere, it all comes down to having good balance to carry out these activities effectively.

Balance Exercises for Children

Balance exercises can be a lot of fun, especially if you get the whole family involved! Reduce the risk of getting injured and up your child’s performance maximization with the following balance exercises for your kids.

1. Balance Board Challenge

A balance board is a flat surface that is built on a rounded or curved stand and tests your balance as you try to remain upright while standing on the board.

As the board wiggles and shifts to throw you off, the longer you try to fight the board, the better your balance will become over time.

2. Hopscotch

Hopscotch is a game that requires you to hop and jump your way onto certain hand-drawn squares on the ground.

Challenge your child to hop and jump using only one leg, without constantly switching to the opposite leg. Give this game a try yourself — it’s not as easy as it looks!

3. Swimming

An excellent all-body workout, swimming challenges the body to work against resistance and engages all the muscles in the body. Not only is swimming a fun activity that the whole family can be involved in, but your child will develop improved motor skills in the long run.

4. Cycling/Biking

Cycling is another low impact but highly effective workout to improve your child’s balance. If your child is still on training wheels, try to train them to ride a bike on two wheels instead.

The more frequently they ride their bikes around, the better their balance and coordination will become in the long run. Plus, biking is way healthier than driving to places anyway.

5. One-Leg Trampoline Challenge

Engage in a game of who can balance longer on the trampoline using only one leg! Maybe get a third person involved to walk around to add a challenging twist to the game.

Want to Challenge Your Child Further?

Here’s some added fun: Encourage your child to try out the mentioned exercises with their eyes closed. This is extremely helpful if your child has become an expert in a lot of their sports and activities mentioned above.

Performing any exercise or activity with your eyes closed is often a lot harder (and could be more fun) than doing the same thing with your eyes open.