Okay, today’s post is for all you mothers out there with growing families. As a martial arts and fitness instructor I hear the excuses all the time. I’m so busy with my kids I don’t have time to exercise! Well this may be a solution for keeping not only you but your whole family healthy at the same time. You can enjoy a fitness program catering to family fitness. I have taught quite a few mother and daughter teams in my cardio kickboxing classes over the years. Not only do they push each other to get fit together but it allows parents time to bond with their kids. I’ve also taught husband and wife teams as well. Most of the time it was great while on a couple of occasions I had to deal with spousal arguments during class. On the positive side at least they are taking their frustrations out during the workouts. In the end, they were probably to tired to argue when they got home.

Anyways back to the family fitness topic. So what kind of workouts are involved in a family fitness class or facility? The list is endless. One of my favorites and I’m being a little biased here, is a family oriented martial arts academy. One of the martial arts that are known to cater to families are Taekwondo schools. They spend a lots of money advertising to parents offering childrens and family programs.

Before joining there are many things to take into consideration:

1). Find out what the credentials of the instructors are and if they have a website. Their website should list their credentials. If it doesn’t then that is a red flag to avoid that school. Don’t get fooled by photos of them posing with famous people. If they have actual credentials you should be able to trace their belt or certificate to a reputable organization.

2). Watch a class for an hour and talk to the head instructor about the program after class. Ask him/her how many classes he teaches. This is important because you don’t want to pay big money to be taught by their 14 year old assistant.

3). Watch a class where the head instructor teaches. Make note of his teaching style and posture. Is he encouraging, positive, and patient with the students, or is he egotistical, condesending, and abusive towards the students. If he/she is the latter then find another academy as they are not worth your time and money. The head instructor should be presentable and professional. These traits filter down to the students.

4). Make note of the students attitude and demeanor during class. Are they respectful towards their fellow classmates, or are they reckless, out of control, and injuring others. Let me state there is nothing to be proud of when you consistently injure other students. They are your training partners and without them you will not improve.

5). Don’t sign any contracts on the spot. Take them home with you and look it over. Make sure the school is not trying to sell you a black belt. Earn it.

6). Check out other martial arts academies as a comparison.

Tags: Family Fitness, Martial Art, Physical exercise, Weight loss for women

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 25th, 2009 at 10:26 pm and is filed under Family Fitness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.