We have all heard the songs today, one that I especially like when working with kids is the Cha Cha Slide. This song is long, but it is a great work out for young kids. There are things that kids are learning while beebopping to the music. For example, they are learning left to right, they are learning to cross their mid line, they are learning to slide, and yes this is an important skill.

Teaching children Locomotion Skills is not only great exercise, locomotor skills are the basic ways to move, the building blocks of coordination. Help your child practice these important skills: walking, galloping, jumping, hopping, side-sliding, leaping and skipping. Start gradually with walking (the easiest) and steadily advance to skipping (the most difficult).

Follow up:

Use transition times to teach these, skip to the dinner table, slide across the smooth floor on the way down the hall to the bathroom. When things are closing in on you on those snow days or rainy days, turn up the tunes and rock out with you kiddos and sneak in some of these skills.

Here are some suggestions to help guide you along the way:

Walking ~ slow smooth walking alternating arms and feet, deep knee bends (imagine walking like a duck), quick small steps,  high up on tipytoes.

Gallop ~ Climb on your horse, remember, one foot leads while the other follows. Don't forget to switch directions and feet!

Hopping ~ With one foot on the ground, push with toes. How fast can you hop? How slowly? Is one side harder than the other?

Side-sliding ~ Move sideways with one foot leading (a sideways gallop). Have your kid spread his or her arms wide and get some air in the middle of the slide.

Leaping ~ Jump over an object leading with one foot while landing on the other. Jumpropes work well as do little cones.

Skipping ~ perhaps one of the most important, and often the most difficult to teach. Begin by marching with knees HIGH in the air, when one knee is high, hop on the other foot, Step/hop, step/hop, step/hop. Now, add, step/ hop/ change feet, step/hop/change feet. Keep practicing, this one helps with all kinds of different learning development in the brain.

Take some time out of your stressful live and spend some time getting into the locomotion with your child!