Canadian Kids Receive D for Walking and Cycling
The image of a child sitting in front of a television or computer is becoming an increasingly common one in Canadian households. This sedentary lifestyle applies to the way Canadian children get to and from school; fewer and fewer children are using active transportation (such as walking or cycling) to get to school.
In fact, Active Healthy Kids Canada recently awarded Canada with a "D" grade for active transportation, and outlined these stats:
- 24% of Canadian children use only active modes of transportation in trips to and from school
- 42% of kids are driven to school
- Majority of parents who drive indicated that they would allow their children to walk/cycle to/from school if the kids were not alone
Even more troubling, Active Healthy Kids Canada assigned an "F" to Physical Activity Levels for the fifth year in a row. Only seven per cent of Canadian children and youth meet the new Canadian Physical Activity Guidelines of at least 60 minutes of daily moderate-to vigorous-intensity physical activity.
These statistic puts Canada at the bottom of the class compared to European and Western Pacific countries. European children and youth take about 2,400 steps more per day than Canadian children and youth.
A recent Canadian study takes a closer look at some of the factors associated with children and active transportation.
- Children increasingly use active transportation to travel to school until they reach ten or eleven years of age. After that, the numbers decline.
- Children who had friends in their area were more than twice as likely to increase their active commuting over two years compared to other children
- Adolescents less likely to increase their active transportation if there were no traffic lights or pedestrian crossings on their route to school.
"Active transportation representation an affordable and easy way to incorporate physical activity in the daily routines of children" explains the author of the study, Dr. Roman Pabayo of the University of Montreal Hospital Research Centre.
As a parent, what can you do to get your kids moving?
Parents play a key role in modeling and facilitating an active lifestyle to their children; whether it's encouraging kids to continue walking or cycling to school after the age of ten, helping them connect with friends in the neighbourhood to journey to school together, or teaching them to be safe when walking or cycling. Start children walking to school early by forming a walking school bus.
Read tips on how to TravelSmart your way to school.
What's been your experience of using active transportation to and from school?