This National Children’s Day, the Active Essex Foundation team want to highlight the importance of healthy childhoods. Staying active is a crucial part of a child’s development but it’s also essential to teach children about the importance of positive mental wellbeing and healthy lifestyles.
Having positive attitudes towards physical activity is key for children and young people to ensure they continue these habits into adulthood. Physical activity doesn’t have to be limited to competitive sports clubs and groups. Making small changes such as actively travelling to school or using weekend time to explore nature spots and parks in Essex, can help maintain a healthy lifestyle from a young age.
Maintaining a healthy lifestyle also extends to the nutritional choices we make! Teaching young people about the importance of a healthy and balanced diet, will not only ensure they carry these habits through to adulthood but It will also give them enough energy to be active and feel good because they’re properly fuelled.
The Essex ActivAte programme offers young people fun and engaging holiday clubs, which help children across the county to get moving for their physical and mental wellbeing. With mental health being at the forefront of their programme, they strive to teach young people the importance of a healthy lifestyle through different physical, enrichment and food activities, as well as offer specialist mental wellbeing hubs to enhance young children's' confidence and independence, in a more quiet and calm environment.
Educating young people to talk about their feelings and offering a range of activities to them to help them deal with any difficult emotions is an important life lesson. In many projects and programmes supported by the Active Essex Foundation, there is a mentoring opportunity that helps benefit young people in learning how to handle certain emotions, especially through the outlet of movement. This includes boxing, martial arts and fitness sessions that young people love to engage with.
Healthy childhoods go further than physical activity and we want to ensure we help young people on the right path so they can lead healthy lives into adulthood.