Encouraging Physical Activity in Children: Quality Time with Family Through Wall Bars

Do you have any family traditions, shared habits, or hobbies that both adults and kids enjoy? If not, or if you have a few but are open to adding something new and exciting, why not consider the idea of exercising together as a family?

Creating a New Family Tradition

You’ve probably heard about the benefits of physical activity from every corner: it helps manage stress, prevents depression, strengthens both children and adults, helps develop important skills, and teaches discipline. All of this is true. But often, the issue isn’t that you or your children don't want to exercise. More often, the problem is that the whole family is too busy. Children have school, extracurricular activities, and daycare, while parents are swamped with work and household tasks. When you finally have a moment to spare, it’s just that—a moment. Why not turn that brief time into quality time with family and add a bit of sport to those moments?

What Will You Need?

Let’s start with something simple: a Swedish Ladder workout. It’s great if you already have a Swedish ladder at home. If not, there’s likely one at a nearby outdoor playground. You can also purchase a Swedish Wall Bars set with accessories as a gift for yourself and your kids. It’s affordable, takes up minimal space, and offers significant benefits.

We suggest starting with exercises on the Swedish Bar because they are simple, fun for kids, and highly beneficial for adults. For children, playing on the Swedish ladder improves motor skills, agility, coordination, flexibility, muscle strength, spatial awareness, balance, and posture.

Do Adults Need Swedish Ladder Workouts?

Yes, especially if you:

• Spend a lot of time driving,
• Work long hours at a computer or have a sedentary office job,
• Occasionally experience back or neck pain,
• Don’t have time for a full workout but want to stay healthy,
• Your doctor has recommended moderate physical therapy instead of intense activity.

Another great reason to start using the Swedish ladder lies in encouraging physical activity in children. You can tell your kids a thousand times that exercise is important and healthy, but children learn best by watching what you do.

Kids mimic their parents—it’s a natural reflex that has helped them learn to talk, stand, walk, run, brush their teeth, and more. If you want your children to enjoy sports, they need an example to follow.

What Will This New Family Tradition of Swedish Bar Workouts Give You?

Joint physical exercises are an excellent way to strengthen your emotional bond with your child. Laughing together, supporting each other, and staying active brings joy and benefits everyone’s health. Each Swedish Ladder workout helps release both physical and emotional tension. Physical activity triggers a release of endorphins and dopamine (the “feel-good” hormones), leaving everyone in a positive mood. This tradition will not only bring joy and energy to your life but also give your children a sense of support and love.

Parents as Role Models: How to Get Kids Excited About Physical Activity

Start first! Your kids will want to join. To keep it fun and appealing for the whole family, turn the exercises into a game. Avoid making it a boring routine. You could organize small competitions or come up with a game, like who can hang from the Swedish ladder the longest or run their own mini “marathon.”

Is your child already interested? Great! Now celebrate each of their successes, no matter how small. This quality time with family will bring motivation and a positive atmosphere to everyone involved.

What Exercises Can You Do on the Swedish Ladder?

Here are a few ideas to get you started. You can invent new exercises and games, work out at your own pace, and adjust the intensity to suit each family member’s abilities.

Hanging from the bar: Monkeys in the jungle

If you haven’t worked out in a while, pulling yourself up might seem challenging. Start by simply hanging, and gripping the bar. Take turns with your kids. You can even make it a challenge (“Who can hang for 10 seconds? What about 20 seconds?”). Take turns so everyone gets time to rest and cheer each other on.

Exercise: Inflate and deflate the balloon

Another fun and beneficial exercise for your Swedish Ladder workout. Standing on the lowest rung, facing the wall, hold onto a higher rung at chest height. Slowly pull your back away from the ladder, rounding your spine (inflating the balloon). Then slowly return to the starting position.

You can also try this in reverse. Stand with your back to the ladder, gripping the rungs with both hands and feet, and try to bend forward with your torso.

Leg raises

This is a great exercise for strengthening your core. Adults can lift their legs to a 90-degree angle, while children can do an easier version—raising their knees. To make it more challenging, try doing scissor kicks with your legs.

Squats while holding the bar

Squats can be tough, especially without prior training. The Swedish Bar can make it easier. Place your hands on a rung in front of you at chest height. Step back slightly and begin squatting and standing, using the bar for support.

A fun squat challenge

You squat once, your child squats once. If the whole family is involved, each person does one squat. The next round, everyone does two squats, then three, and so on. The winner is the one who lasts the longest. But if everyone’s having fun, the whole family wins automatically.

There are countless other exercises you can do at home with your children. Even more options open up when you have a Swedish Bar with gymnastic accessories. The ladder’s functionality increases significantly.