Need help with 9 year ols

JulieAnn72

I have no idea if this is appropriate for MFP but since I'm on here every day, I figured I'd ask. My 9 year old son is tall and thin. He's 4'9" and 67 lbs. Today he did a fitness test in PE. It was just running today. He says he was the slowest kid. He didn't meet the 4th grade standard, whatever that was. I have no idea if this is true but if it is, I'm concerned. He will be tested for sit ups and push ups later. He says he can't do push-ups. He's confident about sit ups.

I'm wondering what can a 9 year old do in terms of working out and getting fit? How can I help him? I run 2 miles every other day. I'm considering doing just 1 mile next time and having him come with me. Tomorrow I'm planning a strength workout and told him he should do sit-ups and push ups with me.

Any advice on what we can do to help improve his fitness level? I really don't know what's appropriate for a kid.

trogalicious

playing more outside?

Sjenny5891

You should talk to his doctor to make sure there isn't anything physically wrong to keep him from exercising.

I have some exercises I'm not good at. Some that I am. You could find one of those 30 day challenges and follow it- just maxing out at a lower number. I have seen some that keeps the same number of Jumping Jacke or Push Ups every day.

Over the summer I took the kids to the park and had them walk a lap with me before they could hit the playground.

JulieAnn72

Thanks. He plays outside just about every day, but it's not like he's out there doing pushups, lifting heavy things or running laps with his friends. They have a blast outside, but it's clear he's not building any strength out there.

aNewMiniMe

Check out the Presidential Fitness Challenge below. This is a guideline used by some schools. We shouldn't "test" our children's fitness at that age but we should challenge them. But I would agree, first and foremost, check with your doctor and be sure there are no other issues.

Turn the TV off and 60 mins a day of play! Best answer ever.


https://www.presidentschallenge.org/challenge/physical/benchmarks.shtml

huango

I think some kids are more inclined to some things vs others.
My 9yrs old son is shorter and thin, but very muscular/lean because he is a very active boy (think Dennis the Menace). He has trouble sitting still, so he chooses to stay pretty active.
Examples:
- he does pullups w/ his own bunk beds (he can do 6 in a row)
- he does laps in the house during commercials
- I just learned this week that he can do clapping pushups

But I would not say he's the "norm". A few of his friends can barely do a pushup.

Since he's so full of energy, I usually redirect him to active stuff, like to run laps or climb trees or biking. He has his very active younger sister to keep up with him, so the 2 of them are usually doing something physical.

So I truly think you can help your son slowly progress and improve on his physical achievements.
Slowly but surely, and keep it fun.
Have him do the monkey bars (help w/ upper arm strength, to help w/ pushups) while having fun.
Play tag: helps w/ building speed (mini short sprints).
Play basketball/ride bikes, etc.
I have him help me carry baskets of clean laundry upstairs, or bring in groceries from the car.
He LOVES giving his 7yrs old sister piggy-back rides.

So play w/ him. He can totally pass his PE test.

Amanda

ttippie2000

Limiting screen time is definitely a good idea. You might check out if there are some sports he's interested in playing. Soccer, swimming, Lacrosse, basketball, tennis are all good workouts and fun. And working out with his family is great if it's done in an encouraging way. Unstructured play is also great exercise. A kid playing playground games for an hour will burn as much as you will in a hard aerobics class.

orczombie

I'm not a parent, but this seems like an unnecessary concern. He's a 4th grader. Does he really need to build strength? Let him be a kid. Some sports might build him in those areas, but I'd let him do what he's interested in as far as physical activity goes. He doesn't sound unhealthy.

jimmmer

This is madness!

Testing little kids and making them feel inadequate because they can't run to a certain speed or do a bunch of sit-ups is like some kind of brown-shirt nightmare.

What happened to letting kids be kids?

As long as he is getting some fresh air and engaging in some physical activities appropriate to his age (which you say he is), then I wouldn't worry about him being an olympian just yet.

huango

Also, does your son do any team sports/after school activities?

My son loves:
- soccer
- skiing
- basketball
- swimming team

He's starting Lacrosse and Karate this year.

Then w/ Boy Scout, they hike a lot and play capture the flag, etc.

All these activities help get the energy out so he can sit calmly for Chinese school and guitar lessons.

Gymnastic classes were great. He loved climbing the rope, oh, so so high.

He wants to be like Jackie Chan and climb all over walls and stuff.
So again, my son is not the "norm".

(In case it matters, my kids get 1 hour of TV/computer time a day outside of school).

ahamm002

Kids at the age of 9 generally aren't going to get great exercise by simply playing outside. Try and get your son involved in actual sports! That way he'll really push himself and finally get into better shape.

AlsDonkBoxSquat

Orgnized sport.

mariahk35

I think running and exercising with your son is a great idea. My middle daughter who wasn't a runner joined cross country this year and now a few months later is coming in 3rd out of 29 girls she is running a mile and a half in 9.45 minutes. Sure it was hard work but she ran a little father each day and is going districts. I should add she is only 11. If not remembe3 all kids are different, check with a doctor. But as long as there is nothing wrong, I wouldn't stress to much

KentWhiteRabbit

This is madness!

Testing little kids and making them feel inadequate because they can't run to a certain speed or do a bunch of sit-ups is like some kind of brown-shirt nightmare.

What happened to letting kids be kids?

As long as he is getting some fresh air and engaging in some physical activities appropriate to his age (which you say he is), then I wouldn't worry about him being an olympian just yet.

^^^ this ^^^

There is too much 'monitoring' of kids at such young ages these days. So he runs a little slower, so what! So long as he's healthy and can actually run it matters not a jot how fast.

If your son wants to do more sports, by all means encourage him but also reassure him that someone has to be the slowest, and that (as I'm sure is the case) he is top of the class in other ways. I say that as a mum to a now 16 year old who was not good at PE/games at school, particularly at 7-12 years old. Happily my encouragement worked and although the only sport he does now is fencing he is fit and healthy and he wants some weights for Christmas :-)

primal_cupcakes

Aye aye to sports. My kids are 7,7 and 9 and have been involved in swimming for a couple years now. It's not inexpensive, and they eat like little horses, but it's worth it because it gives them confidence and strength and gets them into the spirit of being a good teammate.

When I was a kid, there was a school-system wide track and field league for girls as young as fourth grade. I can not emphasize enough how positive of an experience it was to be involved in organized sports.

Kids that participate in sports get set up for a lifetime relationship with sports and fitness and playing well with others. Healthy body image, confidence, problem solving, strength and conditioning ... the benefits go on and on.

Your son sounds like a good kid. What kind of sports do you think he might be interested in?

Boogage

What an awful test! Your son sounds healthy and active so I don't think you need to worry. My 9 year old is very lazy and has always been tubby because of it but he is healthy so the doctor says. He runs a bit and loves to climb but couldn't do push ups or anything like that. I've tried to get him involved in exercising with me but he's not interested. He wants to lift weights but I think he's too young for that. We do our best to get him out walking and playing often at the park.

On the other hand most of my other children (who are younger) never sit still. They are slim and lean and love to run and climb. My 7 year old son climbs up the walls to the ceiling in our hallway and my 6 year old daughter is getting the hang of it too although she's not quite as strong yet.

Just encourage your son to stay active and I'm sure more strength will come in time.

ellipse1

I have to agree with some of these posts.

My son is 15 and is now starting to engage is more strength training based exercises. He is extremely active and plays a lot of sports!

I was always told by his doctor that because he is growing it is unnecessary to pursue strength training because it could in fact cause more damage. I would personally avoid any type of strength training that includes weights as well!

Organized sports are great for getting physical!

Tiernan1212

My daughter just turned 13, and I got her into sports as soon as I could. She now plays travel softball, and basketball at her school. My son is 5, and just started kindergarten. He's a tiny little guy, only weighs about 40lbs, but he loves TV shows like Wipeout and Ninja Warrior, so when he plays he's constantly making up games about obstacle courses (which means hanging on things, and jumping on and off of everything lol). He also shoots baskets at his sisters practices, and plays his version of baseball while we watch his sisters softball games. Plus, now that he's in school he's old enough to start playing rec sports so he's going to try wrestling (thank goodness they do that by weight class!)
I recently started doing Insanity, and both kids LOVE doing it with me, especially my son. Sure, he doesn't do the whole workout, and takes breaks whenever he wants to, but he's having a blast and seeing that exercise is a lot of fun.
Encourage your son to be active, but also explain to him that kids develop at different rates, and not everyone is going to be good at everything (which I'm sure you've done).
I think it's great that you want your son to be active and healthy, and try not to worry too much about a school standard :flowerforyou:

chroniclesofthinoholic

I couldn't run fast or do push ups and I know many kids the same way. Some kids are fast, some kids are slow. Not everyone are equal in sports. As long as he is healthy, playing outdoors and not forever in front of the TV junking I should think it should be fine and it's kinda sad to think the school would actually test him and also tell him about the "bad results" making him feel bad...

Involve him in some kind of sports like soccer, basket ball (Since he's tall) or tennis or even swimming and that should be enough of a workout for a kid.

ahamm002

This is madness!

Testing little kids and making them feel inadequate because they can't run to a certain speed or do a bunch of sit-ups is like some kind of brown-shirt nightmare.

What happened to letting kids be kids?

As long as he is getting some fresh air and engaging in some physical activities appropriate to his age (which you say he is), then I wouldn't worry about him being an olympian just yet.

Not really, 9 year olds aren't toddlers anymore. Children that age should be doing some sort of physical activity that challenges them. The habits that a 9 year old forms may set the stage for his future health. You're not doing a kid any favors by waiting until they're in high school and then telling them it's time to start exercising. At that point the kid will think that they're just naturally not athletic, when in reality they've just never been in shape.

I used to play all sorts of sports throughout elementary school, and I clearly remember how out of shape and slow I got during the off season b/w sports. If I had never played those sports I probably would have just thought that I was slow and not good at running or sports. Nor would I have been able to make any of the sports teams I played on during highs school, which taught me what my athletic limits were. Those memories made losing weight and getting back into shape a lot easier after letting myself go for awhile.

3foldchord

Is he kind?
Is he healthy?
Does he have activities he enjoys?

If so, there is no need for concern that he doesn't fit government standards for how 9 yr olds should be physically.

This reminds me the modern day fable "Animal School"

Once upon a time, the animals decided they must do something to meet the standards of the world. So they organized a school.
They adopted an activity curriculum consisting of running, climbing, swimming and flying. To make it easier to administer the curriculum, all the animals took all the subjects.
The duck was excellent in swimming, in fact better than his instructor, but he made only passing grades in flying and was very poor in running. Since he was slow in running, he had to stay after school and also drop swimming in order to practice running. This was kept up until his webbed feet were badly worn and he was only average in swimming. But average was acceptable in school, so nobody worried about that except the duck.
The rabbit started at the top of the class in running, but had a nervous breakdown because of so much make-up work in swimming.
The squirrel was excellent in climbing until he developed frustration in the flying class where his teacher made him start from the ground up instead of from the treetop down. He also developed a "charlie horse" from overexertion and then got a C in climbing and a "D" in running.
The eagle was a problem child and was disciplined severely. In the climbing class he beat all the others to the top of the tree, but insisted on using his own way to get there so was deducted points for not following the approved method.
.....

benol1

My 12 year old son also came home with a poor fitness test result from school. The answer is to get your son more active. Get him involved in some outdoor actvity/sport that he enjoys. Perhaps something you can do together.
All the best,

Ben

primal_cupcakes

Is he kind?
Is he healthy?
Does he have activities he enjoys?

If so, there is no need for concern that he doesn't fit government standards for how 9 yr olds should be physically.

This reminds me the modern day fable "Animal School"

Once upon a time, the animals decided they must do something to meet the standards of the world. So they organized a school.
They adopted an activity curriculum consisting of running, climbing, swimming and flying. To make it easier to administer the curriculum, all the animals took all the subjects.
The duck was excellent in swimming, in fact better than his instructor, but he made only passing grades in flying and was very poor in running. Since he was slow in running, he had to stay after school and also drop swimming in order to practice running. This was kept up until his webbed feet were badly worn and he was only average in swimming. But average was acceptable in school, so nobody worried about that except the duck.
The rabbit started at the top of the class in running, but had a nervous breakdown because of so much make-up work in swimming.
The squirrel was excellent in climbing until he developed frustration in the flying class where his teacher made him start from the ground up instead of from the treetop down. He also developed a "charlie horse" from overexertion and then got a C in climbing and a "D" in running.
The eagle was a problem child and was disciplined severely. In the climbing class he beat all the others to the top of the tree, but insisted on using his own way to get there so was deducted points for not following the approved method.
.....

^This is a cool story. Thank you.

JoRocka

This is madness!

Testing little kids and making them feel inadequate because they can't run to a certain speed or do a bunch of sit-ups is like some kind of brown-shirt nightmare.

What happened to letting kids be kids?

As long as he is getting some fresh air and engaging in some physical activities appropriate to his age (which you say he is), then I wouldn't worry about him being an olympian just yet.

Not really, 9 year olds aren't toddlers anymore. Children that age should be doing some sort of physical activity that challenges them. The habits that a 9 year old forms may set the stage for his future health. You're not doing a kid any favors by waiting until they're in high school and then telling them it's time to start exercising. At that point the kid will think that they're just naturally not athletic, when in reality they've just never been in shape.

I used to play all sorts of sports throughout elementary school, and I clearly remember how out of shape and slow I got during the off season b/w sports. If I had never played those sports I probably would have just thought that I was slow and not good at running or sports. Nor would I have been able to make any of the sports teams I played on during highs school, which taught me what my athletic limits were. Those memories made losing weight and getting back into shape a lot easier after letting myself go for awhile.

i have to agree with this. by 9/10 you should have doing SOME thing. I think i could do push ups by the time I was 4/5. In middle school I did more chin ups than any other kid in my class. i was an average runner and not particularly suited for many sports- I did ride horses- and worked on a ranch- so that kept me busy and strong- but I could do full military style push ups- because well that's the family I grew up in.

My other family had his kids running the by the time they were in there early teens- one didn't like it- she took up swimming- I think she's like 14 now- and he said she had to pick a training program or continue to run with him... she picked P90X... all on her own.

At 9 there should be SOME sort of something going on. organized or not.

MB_Positif

My son who is 7 has run up to two miles with me and he loves it. We also play tennis together. He lifts weight with me too. We keep them light (except because I love deadlifts, he always wants to do more...he has deadlifted 45 pounds). He only weighs 43 pounds and is very very thin. It's completely fine for him to exercise with you. That said, not everyone meets those standards and that is ok too.

JulieAnn72

Thank you for all of the responses!

My son does play golf right now, but that's not helping with his running speed or strength. He does enjoy it though, and it is helping with overall fitness, I'm sure, since he has to walk 9 holes once or twice a week.

He has played some team sports in the past. He has tried flag football and soccer. Over the summer, he mentioned he might like to try basketball, so I think I'll see if we can get him into that for the winter when he won't be golfing as much.

We do limit screen time to 2 hours a day max. He spends a lot of time playing with his friends outside and inside.

This morning, I decided not to workout and he came in to my room and seemed disappointed. So I got up and showed him how to do pushups on the railing in the hallway instead of on the ground. He was excited to be able to them that way. Then he wanted to show me how he can do situps, so he did 10 while I held his feet. I encouraged him to do a few pushups and situps each day and he seems interested.

Friday is walk to school day so we'll definitely do that. I'll make more of an effort to get both of my kids outside moving around more often.

rml_16

Thanks. He plays outside just about every day, but it's not like he's out there doing pushups, lifting heavy things or running laps with his friends. They have a blast outside, but it's clear he's not building any strength out there.

They don't climb trees or play baseball or anything like that? Tag? Hide and seek?

Those were the things we did and I never had a problem passing the physical fitness tests.

randomtai

I have a 9 year old as well, and I can't stand those "physical fitness tests". All they do is make kids feel bad about themselves. Let kids be kids.

SezxyStef

Your son is a healthy weight and height for his age (check growth charts) 75th percentile for weight and 105 percentile for his height... healthy kid ( tall tho...so I suspect that is what makes him look thin) My son was in the 50th percentile for weight...over 100 for height until the rest of the kids caught up with him. But that being said he apparently is not very active. My son at the same age was climbing trees, running, playing, biking, hiking...you name it he did it and he was a strong kid he didn't do organized sports until he was 12...then it wa rugby cause he was strong...not hockey he is uncordinated..no basketball his shot is horrible...

Organized sports could help but that is expensive...kids need to play outside....do things that challenage him...my nephew who is the same age helps throw the wood in....rakes leaves with his father, climbs trees, climbs on monkey bars...

But that being said all these people who are saying it is madness to test this...are you aware that north american children are on average overweight and/or obese....many are getting type 2 diabetes in their early years....my own neice had to have her gall bladder removed due to her poor diet and obesity.

1 in 3 kids in the US are now classed as overweight and/or obese....that is madness. I may get bashed for this but the problem is that people don't want their kids to feel "bad"...that they don't measure up...that whole "no kid left behind" mentailty that has gone too far...where there are no losers all winners and get a medal for showing up...give me a break.:grumble:

dandelyon

You would think that he is already getting exercise, since he is obviously in PE. I guess I would ask him if he wants to get faster at running, or if he wants to take up a sport, and follow his lead.

It sounds like he would like to be in better shape but needs guidance. I went running with my son in the mornings all summer. We ran a 5k together and he beat me, I'm sure that felt great to him :P

markpmc

My 9 yo is 5' even, about 115 lbs and seems a bit chubby. He's currently in Fall Soccer (competed 5 years), just tried out for basketball (competed 4 years) and will roll into fast pitch baseball (5 years again) in the spring. I've been his team coach all the way. Just make the decision to get him active, he'll follow and have a good time along the way.

My son is among the slowest in his class. No reason for concern. The tall kids always develop speed later than the little guys. That said my kid did indeed pick out his own workout. The Spartan Workout from Men's Health. He does it twice a week w/ 5 lb DBs. It's helped his overall coordination.