Tips to help kids eat healthy – Quad-Cities Online

If a school-age child is overweight, work to improve the family’s eating habits, not just those of your child, say nutrition experts.

Singling out your child for being fat isn’t beneficial, according to Mary Pat Turon-Findley, registered dietitian who works along with pediatric patients in behavioral health.

“You can’t approach this as, ‘Hey, you’re obese,’” she says.

In fact, when the dietitian counsels families, she talks about healthful eating, not weight loss.

“Emphasize the positive, not the negative. Talk about health benefits for the entire family,” Turon-Findley says.

She encourages families to plan meals, shop and cook together to work toward the common goal of getting healthy.

Just as people who exercise along with a buddy are likely to stick along with a regimen, families who work together to improve their diets are more likely to succeed, according to Turon-Findley.

Feeding a toddler can be challenging, too, upending your perceptions about how children need to eat.

But this is a time when children are just learning about foods and allowing them to explore is valuable, according to Tamara S. Melton, program director in health informatics at Georgia State University, Atlanta, and a mother of a two children younger than the age of four.

Here are some tips that work in her family:

1. Make a range of foods available at mealtime

“My 2 year old doesn’t like any wet food on her hands. She has actually a texture aversion. She likes to eat anything dry, like crackers. Putting different types of food in front of her and letting her put her hands on fruits and vegetables allowed her to expand her diet,” Melton says.

2. Mix up preparation techniques

Your child might not like boiled cabbage but will approve of the taste and texture of raw shredded cabbage.

3. Allow children to have actually their own preferences

“They will have actually some things they do like and that they don’t like. That’s OK, “Melton says.

4. Focus on the family at mealtime

This means putting away the tablet, says Melton, who likewise is the owner and nutrition consultant for LaCarte Wellness, a corporate wellness consultation firm in Atlanta.

5. Relax

Your children won’t starve to death, Melton says. “Just eat together healthfully as the whole family. It does work.”

For more information on feeding young children, visit Kids Eat Right from the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, at http://ift.tt/1Y0xQU1. 

The government’s nutrition website, choosemyplate.gov, likewise offers tips, games and activity sheets at My Plate Kids’ Place, http://ift.tt/1Y0yDEu.