The overall importance of healthy eating habits

Kids Corner | 15.09.2020 | M&Z Ltd
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Healthful eating has many benefits for children. It can stabilise their energy levels, improve their brain function and mood, and help them maintain a healthy weight.

Healthy eating can help prevent many chronic diseases later on in life, such as obesity, heart disease, diabetes and other diet-related conditions. Healthy eating habits are more likely to stay with you if you learn them as a child. That’s why it’s important that you teach your children good food habits at a young age.

Getting your children to eat nutritious foods and finding the time to prepare healthy meals can be challenging. But there are ways you can teach and support your children in eating healthily.

 

The following tips can help to teach children
healthy eating habits early in life:

• Start the day with a healthy, balanced breakfast, such as an omelette, a bowl of wholegrain cereal with milk or an on-the-go option, e.g. a homemade granola bar.

• Get children involved in the meal planning, food shopping and preparation. Teach them how to read a food label so they know the nutrition in the foods they’re choosing. They can also perform simple food preparation tasks whilst learning some basic cooking skills.

• Make small shifts to healthier foods – Start with a few alternatives to some unhealthy items in your fridge or food cupboard and add slowly until you’ve adopted healthier food choices. Examples of easy swaps to make include trying soft drinks instead of plain or fruit-infused water, swapping white bread to wholegrain bread, or having frozen yoghurt instead of ice-cream.

• Make fruit and vegetables visible and appealing – This can be done in many ways. One useful tip is to have washed, peeled, cut and ready-to-eat fruits and veggies to make them more accessible. Not all fast, convenience foods are unhealthy ;).

• Be a role model – Kids eat the way you eat. Follow healthy eating principles yourself, and your child will be more likely to eat the way too.

 

 

• Start them young – Food preferences develop early in life. Expose your child to different flavours and textures early on, and continue as they grow older.

• Shift to a positive mindset – Much of the focus is placed on what we should avoid. This can lead to feeling deprived. Instead, focus on what you and your child should be eating i.e. whole, minimally-processed foods.

• Don’t force them to eat – Don’t make your child ‘clean their plate’. They need to learn to listen to their bodies. When they feel full and are allowed to stop eating, they are less likely to overeat.

• Avoid the food reward – When you use sugary food to reward good behaviour or to show affection, your child could start using food to cope with their emotions and sends the message that sugary foods are somehow better or more valuable than other foods, and can start a pattern of
unhealthy eating.

• Put limits on screen time – When you put limits on TV, computer, or video game time, your child will tend to find something more active to do. Also, snacking while watching TV leads to mindless eating, and your child will take in more calories than they should.

For more information about dietary guidelines and serving sizes for children, you can refer to the publication Dietary Guidelines for Maltese Children

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