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Tips for Getting Active

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Everyday Physical Activity Tips

Small steps that get your family to move more can help all of you maintain a healthy weight. Choose a different tip each week for you and your family to try. See if you or they can add to the list. Here are a few:

Walk Whenever Possible

  • Walk instead of drive, whenever you can
  • Walk your children to school
  • Take the stairs instead of the escalator or elevator
  • Take a family walk after dinner
  • Replace a Sunday drive with a Sunday walk
  • Go for a half-hour walk instead of watching TV
  • Get off the bus a stop early, and walk
  • Park farther from the store and walk
  • Make a Saturday morning walk a family habit
  • Walk briskly in the mall
  • Take the dog on longer walks
  • Go up hills instead of around them

Move More in Your Home

  • Garden, or make home repairs
  • Do yard work. Get your children to help rake, weed, or plant
  • Work around the house. Ask your children to help with active chores
  • Wash the car by hand
  • Use a snow shovel instead of a snow blower

Live Actively

  • Join an exercise group, and enroll your children in community sports teams or lessons
  • Do sit-ups in front of the TV. Have a sit-up competition with your kids
  • Pace the sidelines at kids' athletic games
  • Choose an activity that fits into your daily life/lives
  • Use an exercise video if the weather is bad
  • Avoid labor-saving devices, such as a remote control or electric mixers
  • Play with your kids at least 30 minutes a day
  • Dance to music… with your kids
  • Choose activities you enjoy. Ask children what activities they want to do
  • Explore new physical activities
  • Give yourself a gold star with non-food related rewards, such as a family day at the park, lake, or zoo
  • Swim with your kids
  • Buy a set of hand weights and play a round of Simon Says with your kids—you do it with the weights, they do it without

(Source: Adapted from smallstep.gov)

Keep track of tips you’ve tried with our tracking sheetpdf document icon (48 KB)

Last Updated: February 13, 2013