Recommendations for exercise I can do with 8yo daughter

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Long story short, my daughter has become quite overweight in the last year, it's just crept on but is now quite noticeable. I'm determined to help her with this, without her realising and make it fun. We are making changes as a family to meals, but she is by choice quite sedentary so I could definitely help by building in more movement. I thought if we did things together, I could say that we're going to get fit together and she's helping me. She loves dancing and is super flexible so any recommendations that might appeal to a bendy kid/ dancer would be good. She hates walking but we do go for family walks and she takes dance lessons. I really want to help her before the problem becomes any bigger- excuse the pun!

Have you tried something like Geocaching to make walking more fun?

She may just be hitting hormonal changes, I wouldn't mention anything about getting fit, I would just make it a fun thing to do. Do you have a switch? My DD loves Just Dance and we can do it together.

Just dance, if you don’t have a switch you could copy YouTube videos of this. Does she go swimming? Bike riding?

Junior parkrun, dance club after school - sign up for a show or something?

I took DS swimming at that age, when he got a bit overweight. We started by just doing a length of the pool then messing around. Next week, 2 lengths. Week after that, 3. Within 6 months he could swim a mile. We set ourselves small milestones along the way: 100m, 200m, 250, half a kilometre, a kilometre etc and at each one he got a small treat which was non-food. I didn't mention it would be non-food, I was just trying to instil the idea that treats don't have to be food - so he'd get a comic or a mini Lego set or a new tee shirt.

We also regularly went for cycle rides - about 5-8km a couple of times a week.
We had a trampoline and we played silly games on it together, like popcorn (jumping over a football on the trampoline.) You only need to do that for 10 mins while the pasta is boiling.

We'd go to the playpark when it was quiet and I'd try to do things like swinging from the horizontal ladder bars (not sure what they are called) then get him to show me how to do it. Children's bodies - even slightly heavy ones, are better at this, so he could usually do a couple and then got proud of himself and did a few more.

I found an old pedometer which he loved using - it made him go from hating walks to loving them - amazed he had walked 2000 steps on a short walk around the park! These days, as a young adult, he loves walking around the city he works in and often does 20k steps a day - he still loves checking his step count.

Small, silly things like dancing in the kitchen or having a tickle-chase game etc can also help keep them active.

Never ever mention weight or size. Focus on strength and fitness and agility. Look for things she enjoys and can get good at, and try to add a bit of exercise into daily life. We used to go for a hill walk most weekends and chat about things that took the focus off the walk - stuff like what would he spend a million pounds on just for himself or just for other people. Or what would his dream home look like. We ended up walking far further if we had chats like that.

Indoor wall climbing or bouldering - yes you both can do it!

Ice skating

Gardening - digging and clearing up is hard work if you do it right. She won’t have much patience but you can do a bit

Hand wash your car, the windows, the garage doors

Walk or cycle to the shops or a local forest

Daytrip on bus or train go nearest city and find a free museum or shop (always walk up stairs don’t take lifts)

Paddleboard or canoe if any activity lakes or rivers nearby

Teach her to rollerblade or skateboars

Buy her a skipping rope

Take up a family martial arts class

Some really helpful suggestions, thank you. Just dance is a great shout, we have a switch. And I will look into a step counter too, that would appeal to her. Swimming could work too, will look into that

What about a martial arts club that does mixed age classes?

I don't rate them at all for actually developing fighting skills but they can teach the basics and can be good fun (for children and adults) and positively focused on movement, strength, confidence etc.

YouTube or switch dances, park runs, ice skating, horse riding, fitness classes at home, Pilates, getting her to bounce or balance on a Pilates ball whilst watching tv, walk to school or else park and stride if you need to, play dates that are active (trampolining or climbing etc).

Just Dance or there are are similar things on YouTube.

Are there any vigorous dancing groups by you eg street dance?

Would she do something like gym? There are gyms by me that allow children.

Do you have nice cycling routes?

My daughter and I did couch to 5k. We signed up for a fun run so we had a goal, one of those that has water obstacles, and throw paint etc. It made us realise we both really like running.

Ice skating or even figure skating classes if she can already skate.

If she doesnt like walking have you looked at those challenges where you walk (or run or swim etc) a virtual route and get a medal at the end? It's virtual and have really long completion times so you do it at your own pace. They are expensive but the medals can be lovely. This one has a Harry Potter set.
https://www.theconqueror.events/home/

Skipping is great cardio! You can try and increase speed to get as many skips in 1 minute as possible.

Yoga - stretching and flexibility will do you both good if not burn loads of calories.

Bike riding

I'm a junior parkrun fan. My two started young and still go running in their teens. Autistic 15yo has now even run the 5k on his own being dropped off and picked up, and he doesn't normally like being out in public solo.

Moving and dancing will be great for overall fitness but is likely to have very little impact if any on her weight. Download strava on phone and map your walks/run when weather is nice. Pick a destination and route more than wandering without a goal, this might appeal to her more since she hates walking. Create playlists.

Try cooking together making it a contest who has the most vegetables in any given dish or recipes. Keep a vegetables chart in the kitchen for weekly point. Have a competition to try a new vegetable every week and/or a new way of cooking a regular one. Limit the amount of butter/oil/coconut to prepare them to a tablespoon or so.

Geocaching is great, stuff like Danny Go on YouTube or Joe Wicks, places like Innoflate (honestly think DH and I had even more fun than the kids last time we went), dance cardio stuff on YouTube, JustDance for Switch, Zumba on TV or even a class in evenings, FitBit type thing.

But the biggest thing for us is walking pretty much everywhere we can. If it’s walkable, we will walk it. Not talking about leisure walks but for everyday life - school, shops, soft play, Rainbows, to a friend’s house, whatever. I don’t offer the car for that sort of thing unless it’s weather warning type stuff.

I took DD1(6) on a city break thing over the summer and we did 25k steps the first day and she didn’t complain once as she’s just so used to walking every day. It’s a great foundation for functional fitness. Some of her friends are driven everywhere and seem to struggle even walking short distances without complaining.