How to Encourage Children to Eat Healthy

Encouraging a child to eat healthy can be one of the biggest challenges with being a parent or child care provider. Children love to eat but they naturally prefer the sweeter foods. With a little practice, patience and these simple steps you can encourage the children under your care to eat healthier.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Prepare the food attractively. Just like adults, children judge the taste of the food by its appearance. Offer a wide variety of colors on one plate and arrange it nicely.

2. Offer favorite foods alongside unfamiliar foods so the child will have a choice of what to eat. It also prevents a battle at the table over making sure the children eat.

3. Accept the fact that there will be wasted food. Children stop eating when their hunger is satisfied. Accepting the fact that there will be waste also makes it easier for you to offer a new food that you are sure they will not eat at first.

4. Introduce a new food at least 15 to 20 times before expecting a child to even try it. The food has to become familiar to them before they want to eat it.

5. Provide limited choices to help the child feel in control of what they are eating. Say something along the lines of, "You need to have a vegetable with lunch. Would you like peas or carrots?"

6. Realize that children are inconsistent with their eating. Just because they eat something one day does not mean that they will eat it the next day. Determine how well they are eating in the period of one week, not one day.

[ChrisWright]

on 11/16/2007 Good article!! My child ate almost no veggies in her younger days. Now, at 18 she loves vegetables. We did use some of your tips - such as continuing to offer vegetables a number of times, but not forcing them. Thanks !