New Preschool-Based Curriculum for Jumping and Jump Roping Skills Available

The brand new Jump Start! Preschool-Based curriculum is now available under "Resources" as a free download from the Jump Kids Jump Movement website, www.jumpkidsjump.org. This new curriculum, available for free, meets Indiana Academic Standards for Kindergarten and Foundations: Indiana Academic Standards for Young Children from Birth to Age 5.

Also found under "Resources" is the Jump Start! video that is now available as a free complement to the curriculum. The video illustrates some of the jumping activities preschoolers can engage in to develop skills for jumping rope and can be downloaded and burned to a DVD.

To access these free resources, all you need to do is register on the www.jumpkidsjump.org web site.

Says Pattie Ryan, Deputy Director for the Indiana Association for Child Care Resource and Referral (IACCRR), "Our state's preschoolers can benefit considerably from Jump Start! as a way to help them develop and practice jumping skills as an essential first step before learning to jump rope. Jumping rope is a fun physical fitness activity they can do all their lives." The curriculum, a ready-to-go resource for anyone working with preschoolers, contains lessons, activities, and resources to help introduce preschoolers to jumping and jumping rope. With Indiana's children among the most obese in the nation, "early intervention with a curriculum and DVD like Jump Start! is a hands-on way to help our preschoolers develop a fitness life skill that can help prevent them from ever becoming overweight and from battling health problems now and in the future," states Dr. Jeff Sperring, Riley Hospital's Chief Medical Officer.