Stay Active
Keep physically active
It’s important to stay active during this time. While social distancing can mean you’re now spending most of your time indoors, there’s no reason why you can’t be breaking a sweat or stretching out the stress to keep you motivated.
Get social with your exercise from home – We’ve put together #Challenge21 as just an idea of a workout you can do in a small space with no equipment (see opposite for instructions). If you post a video of yourself doing just part of the exercise on social media and tag us and London Youth, you could win £50 of sports equipment!
Online exercise ideas
Aerobic exercises – a great way to get the heart rate up without any equipment or much space. There are so many opportunities on YouTube and Gymshark have made all of their workouts free during this period to keep everyone active at home. All you need to do is download the app to your phone, make an account and get going!
Join Step into Dance online – They’re holding online courses in Street Dance, Contemporary, Battle Preparation, and an inclusive creative project for SEND students, free and open to all young people from London and Essex with a variety of classes from beginner to improve levels.
Bring PE Home – Joe Wicks is becoming the nation’s PE teacher! @thebodycoach will be live streaming PE lessons for young people to do at home during this period of social distancing – they promise to be fun and proactive and can be found on his social media channels. Join in!
Yoga – a great form of exercise with the added bonus of helping with relaxation and stress. There are many beginner, intermediate and advanced classes on YouTube you can check through.
Spark your creativity
There are many creative activities you can practice or even take up at home without needing a lot of materials. From making things to learning skills to entertaining others, there are so many creative ways to entertain yourself indoors. Our wonderful partners The Scouts have created a great resource centre of indoor activities called The Great Indoors with loads of activity ideas to inspire you.
We’ve put together just a few ideas we think might help you find your next hobby, see below…
Art
Art takes more forms than just drawing (although there is that too!), why not try making a collage out of old magazines or newspapers in the house, abstract painting, or sculpture making out of materials in your recycling, or keeping a diary without any words – just drawings. Need some inspiration? Try 64 Million Artists’ Daily Art Challenge!
Not sure where to start? Why not simply do some colouring – a great creative exercise for those unsure where to start, or just want to relax. Select your colours and switch off. You can find free, intricate and downloadable colouring sheets from websites such as Just Colour and Art-Is-Fun.
Music
You don’t need your own musical instrument to make music, there are several free music-making programmes online, such as Magix Music Maker or ScoreCloud (other software is also available). Or how about learning to DJ with these free apps. You could even work on a project with a friend via video calling.
Writing
There are more reasons for writing than just school work, why not try story-writing, keeping a diary or even combining it with drawing to try bullet journaling for a different creative outlet.
There are also several writing competitions running at the moment to keep you inspired and help your CV! Such as The Orwell Youth prize with this year’s theme: The Future We Want. You can write in any form! Youth communications charity Exposure are also looking for young people to express their experience of lockdown creatively, and these will be featured on their website.
The Prince’s Trust, Action for Children and Royal Mail are currently working together to produce online writing packs for young people. They include ten activities to get you thinking about different ways of writing and putting your opinion and experiences to paper.
If you want your voice heard, why not contact the Jack Petchey Foundation about writing a blog for us? We love platforming young people’s writing, and are looking for blog posts about life in lockdown and advice you would give to other young people in the same situation as you. Get in touch! Email pr@petchey.com with an expression of interest to find out more.
There are more writing competitions available to view here.
Video Making
Now might be the time to start recording and editing those videos you’ve been meaning to. Share your voice with the world in a different way, our partners Media Trust have created an amazing Vlogging Online Resource Pack full of training and tips on how to get started.
Get active in your community
There is a lot of talk at the moment about helping the community. We think young people do amazing, positive things every which impact the people around them and we want to keep showing these to the world. Here are some of the ways you can help us.
- Check in with others to see what you can do to help during this difficult time – this could be a neighbour, a friend, a parent, a teacher
- Share positive stories
- Enter our competitions
See below for more details.
Spread positive messaging online
With an overwhelming amount of news each day of the virus, we’ve been trying to promote positive news in various ways. We’re running several social media campaigns with the hope of brightening up people’s feeds and we need your help.
#21DaysofGratitude is a social media campaign designed to help us focus on positive aspects of our lives. Simply share one thing a day you are grateful for for 21 days using the hashtag and tag us! We’ll share them to help keep promoting positivity.
#InspiringMyGeneration is a hashtag we want people to use to talk about how older people inspire them. With older people self-isolating during this time, we want you to reach out to grandparents, neighbours, friends and teachers and share how the inspire you. If you use the hashtag, we’ll pass these stories onto Sir Jack himself, who is still working from home age 94!
Celebrate what’s around you
We have a photography competition running at the moment called The Good In Where I Live. We want you to take a photo of where you live – on your daily walk – and submit it to us with a form explaining what you like about your area. Let’s celebrate the good in London and Essex! The winner will win £250 and have their work viewed by thousands!
For parents – how to keep your child active and happy
The Scouts have put together an impressive interactive page of resources centred on doing things indoors. ‘The Great Indoors’ is a great way to keep your children busy whilst they are at home!
In addition, a brownie leader that works with JPF sent in a list of Indoor Games you can play with your children without any equipment for some light relief during the day.
Why not learn a new skill together? St John’s Ambulance have created an online First Aid Course.
Our partners Young Enterprise have created a digital resource pack full of activities for children and young people aged 4-19 you can access for free here.
If your child suffers from anxiety and this is made worse by the current circumstances, here are some tips on how to help them manage this.
If your child has SEND, then here is an excellent explanation of what the virus is to help them understand.
Get involved with the Jack Petchey Foundation
Enter #TheGoodInWhereILive competition to win £250 or get involved with the wider campaign!
We’re 21 – send us a birthday card!
Write for our website – we are always looking for young writers. If you are aged between 11 and 25 and live in London or Essex, email pr@petchey.co.uk if you would like to write a blog for us!
It can be about how you are staying busy, motivated or inspired during this time, or your proudest achievement/the biggest challenge you’ve overcome. Email us with your thoughts and we will send you a template if you need help!
More resources
Sometimes we all need a little help staying on track. Here are some resources that can help you stay motivated, focused and positive.
- pdfNotes from Sir Jack Petchey
- pdfGoal setting – set yourself manageable goals across 5 weeks
- pdfAchievements log – track your achievements and take pride in your progress
- pdfJob goals – set yourself goals to get to your desired career
- pdfMy qualities – take the time to remind yourself of your top qualities
- pdfSkills shortlist – make a list of your top skills to remind yourself what you’re good at
- pdfSolutions log – if ever something doesn’t go to plan, always look for the best solution
- pdfStep towards the career you want
Feel we're missing something?
We are constantly updating our resources page with the latest information and activities for both young people and youth organisations/schools. If you know of a programme or information source that would be useful that we have not yet included, tell us about it! Fill out the form below.
