Why is exercise good for you?
Authors: Sanne Peters & Hanneke Geerts
Sanne Peters: Pediatric physiotherapist and founder of Breinprikkels
Hanneke Geerts: Pediatric physiotherapist and founder of Breinprikkels
We all know that exercise is good for you, but why is that? 
In short, your brain and central nervous system develop through movement. Your brain ensures that you can move and through movement the brain develops. When you are born, there are a lot of neurons (nerve cells) in your brain, in groups, ready. Each group has its own task, but can only perform its task if they are well connected to each other. Connections between these groups of neurons are made by making movements, so connections are made between different brain areas. By repeating a movement more often, the connection becomes stronger. The more movement there is, the more neuronal networks are created.
The foundation for this is already laid during pregnancy and birth. Reflex patterns are created that help our brain mature. These primary reflex movements are the basis for the development of the connections in our brain. The primary reflexes must fully develop in order to be able to move in a targeted manner and to initiate the total development. When children have not practiced certain movement patterns sufficiently, this can cause parts of the brain to work less well together. This can lead to a child always being 'on', developing learning difficulties, having tantrums or not being able to sit still.
Breinprikkels works in various ways to stimulate motor development in young children as much as possible.
Breinprikkels offers a number of services for this purpose:
– Pre-school exercise program
– Exercise program for toddlers
– Exercise program group 3
– Courses/lectures
– Customized offer
What can you do now to stimulate the above as much as possible?
– Let your children be children and play freely.
– Put babies on their stomachs on the floor to play, for example with the rocker or the baby belly pillow .
– Let older children move a lot, play outside and climb, crawl, crawl. Are you still looking for some outdoor toys? The catapult is fun to use as a challenging game. For the cooperation between both hemispheres of the brain, the swoosh bullet ball and the throw and catch nets are a fantastic addition!
– Don’t be afraid that your child will fall, falling is also part of development. Of course, responsibly! 
– If your child seems to skip the crawling or the crawling, try to stimulate him anyway. Join in with him, challenge him (for example with materials such as a crawling tunnel) or let a brother or sister demonstrate.
– Stand on one leg regularly, create a balance course or hopscotch course or have children dress and undress while standing. Practicing a lot of balance ensures that the child also has to make little effort to stay balanced in other situations, for example when sitting quietly on a chair.
Conclusion
It is important for children (and adults) of all ages to be active. So, regardless of your child's age, go outside with your children a lot and challenge them to climb, play, crawl, hop and balance. The materials from Toys42hands can help you challenge children in their play.
On behalf of Sanne and Hanneke from Breinprikkels we wish you lots of fun exercising!
