Yes, take your kids rafting!  When I was little my dad took me rafting on the Wenatchee several times each summer.  He told me I needed to be the high-sider.  Not really necessary on the Wenatchee in a 15’ boat; especially when I only weighed about 60 lbs.  But it taught me to stick my head into the waves and it made me feel like I played a part in our success. 

Sitting in the front also taught me to read water.  I remember pointing at the biggest white rapid I could find and say, “Hit that one, Dad!” and then I would watch the water and watch his angle and strokes and try and judge where in the rapid we would land and what kind of ride we would get. 

I jumped out, I fell out, we hit a bridge at flood stage once and flipped (oops), when I tried to paddle-captain a small boat for the first time of course we flipped…  But I loved it.  My sister didn’t like it so much and got into rock climbing instead.  And that’s ok.  She’s been on enough beautiful multi-day trips since then that she can enjoy rafting now; especially if she can find a crag to jam her hands in at a camp or along a hike.

And then when I was in high school my dad’s Grand Canyon permit got close to coming up.  We started running bigger stuff to get ready, and then he let me row a gear boat on our Grand trip when I was 20.  I was hooked!

At a year and a half we had my son on the Cat going from Pashasten down to Monitor on the Wenatchee. On his third birthday he got a Jackson Fun 1 and spent a lot of the summer working on paddling in our local pool and at the beach. By the end of summer he was able to somewhat control his boat in moving water in the creek in front of our cabin in the Little North Fork of The Santiam. This year we bought a 16’ raft for family raft trips and spent several days on the Santiam and Umpqua. He absolutely loves it. This past summer he also spent a lot of time doing flat water in his kayak. It will be still a year or more before he will be ready for a skirt.  I have done trips with 5 year olds on the Lower Salmon and Rouge rivers with no problems. Another one we are planning is Desolation / Grey Gray Canyons on the Green. There are lots of trip options for kids.