05/23/2026
If youâve ever run a summer camp or coached youth sports, you know one thing is absolute truth.
Kids donât learn movement from a textbook or from being told what to do. They learn it by doing, and they learn it through play.
Iâm spending the day levelling up with a Childrenâs Fitness Coach course.
Looking at these slides on Fundamental Movement Skills Locomotor, Object Control, and Balanceâtakes me right back to my roots in recreation.
What started as a part-time job in 1999 as an ice skating instructor led me through different aspects of recreation (summer camps, afterschool camps, cruise ships) which taught me that if a game isnât fun, the skill doesnât stick.
You canât just drill repetition. You have to weave it into the experience.
That foundation is exactly why I built the Movement Mentor approach the way I did.
Traditional personal training doesnât work for everyone, especially the neurodivergent kids and young people I coach.
They donât need another rigid fitness routine or someone just barking instructions. They need sport as the entry point, games as the structure, and fitness and regulation as the outcome.
When a kid is playing tag, theyâre working on locomotor skills.
âšWhen theyâre throwing a bean bag at a target, theyâre building object control.
âšWhen theyâre dribbling a soccer ball between cones and shooting on net, theyâre working on speed, agility, and foot-eye coordination.
Theyâre engaged because itâs fun.
Thatâs the magic. Movement, sport, and games arenât separate things. Theyâre the same toolkit, just applied with intention.
