Being stuck at home can leave your kids full of energy with nowhere to spend it. Use simple challenges and activities to keep them active, like using a soccer ball to make a mini-workout more fun! Keep reading for 10 simple and fun activities you can do with a soccer ball (or any ball) in your backyard that your kids will love.

This simple circuit can be a daily or weekly “challenge” for kids, and they can chart their progress.

1. Sit-ups with a Soccer Ball

Make sit-ups more fun and a little more challenging by holding a ball in your hands! Lying on the floor with your knees bent, hold a soccer ball between your hands and stretch all the way back, then sit up, bringing your hands and the ball in front of you to your shins and back again!

• Start with just 10, but if this is too easy, do as many as you can in a minute!

2. Leg Lifts

Hold a ball between your feet and lie flat on the floor. Without moving your upper body, lift the ball, still between your feet, straight up in the air, and back down again.

• Do 10 of these, or as many as you can in a minute.

3. Soccer Juggling

This can be really fun and really challenging! Without using your hands, bounce the ball off your knees, feet, or shoulders and see how many juggles you can do without dropping the ball!

• See if you can build up to 5, 10, 15, or even 20 juggles without dropping the ball!

4. Dribbling Relay

Set up cones or markers of some kind about 15 feet away from each other. Then dribble to each cone as fast as you can. Make it more interesting by doing it forwards, backwards, and sideways. To make it more like a relay, make two teams and see who can finish first. Or, put the ball on the opposite cone and run, skip, or jump to the ball and then dribble back. Get creative!

• See how many times you can get to each cone in a minute.

5. Bowling

Use your soccer ball as a bowling ball and set up water bottles or cones as pins. Bowl the cones down (kicking the ball instead of rolling it), or, to make it more of a challenge, bowl the cones and then race to pick the cones back up.

• See how many cones or targets you can knock down in 10 tries.

6. Soccer Bocce or Target Practice

Using another ball or cone, kick the ball and try to get it as close to the target as possible without hitting it. Other players can hit your ball farther away, too. Whoever gets closer to the pin gets a point.

• The first person to reach 5 points wins! (multi-player)

7. Minefield

Set up cones or other objects in your yard, spread out a few feet apart. Try to dribble from one side of the yard to the other without touching any of the objects. Start slow, and then see how fast you can do it! If you touch a cone, you have to start over!

• Time yourself to see how fast you can dribble through objects without touching them. Set a goal to reduce your time.

8. Twists

Sitting on the ground with your feet in the air, hold a soccer ball between your hands. Without moving most of your body, twist to one side, touch the ball to the ground, and then twist to the other side, doing the same thing.

• Do 10 twists, or however many you can do in a minute!

9. Butterfly Kicks

Lying flat on the floor, hold a ball between your hands, arms outstretched behind you. Without bending your knees, start doing butterfly kicks, kicking up and down, like you’re swimming.

• Do butterfly kicks for 20 seconds.

10. Superman

Lying on your stomach with your arms and legs outstretched, hold a soccer ball either in your hands, between your feet, or both if you want to challenge yourself. Raise your arms and legs off the floor as high as you can, then back down.

• Do this 10 times or hold it for 20 seconds.

These fun exercises are great for keeping kids active and will be fun even if they don’t play soccer. Get creative and make the challenges and exercises more difficult for your kids depending on their ages. Encourage them to challenge themselves in each exercise and do the best they can. 

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Christine Wooler has experience working with children as a youth soccer coach and summer camp counselor. She is currently studying English Literature and journalism in college. She enjoys exploring educational topics that help students have fun while learning.