Guest Post - Top Tips to Get Your Kids to Eat Healthy

Healthy Living Natural Beauty

    Today we are featuring another guest post on Healthy Living Natural Beauty.  Today's post is from nutrition writer Will Kashis who is also an editor for the site Eat Stop Eat Diet Program. He has kindly taken the time to write this creative article for helping kids to eat healthy foods. This article provides some fun and interesting tips for parents.  Pictures provided courtesy of Eat Stop Eat Diet Program.

Top Tips to Get Your Kids to Eat Healthy Getting your kids to eat healthy foods can sometimes seem like a never-ending battle between parent and child. In general, children would much prefer to eat chocolate and sweets than carrots and lettuce, and at such a young age, they don’t fully understand the health benefits of eating fruit and vegetables. Healthy foods seem boring to young children, and unless you show them otherwise, their opinion isn’t likely to change any time soon. Here are some top tips to get your kids eating healthier foods so that they become fit, strong and full of life. Reward them This works particular well with very young children and is simple and easy to do. Get some reward charts and stick them on the wall or fridge in the kitchen. After each meal, if they’ve eaten their vegetables and the other healthy foods which are on their plate, let them put a sticker next to the correct day on their reward chart. At the end of the week, give them a treat in the form of either chocolates and sweets or a non-edible item! Have fun with food Children love having fun, and if you can turn dinnertime into playtime, your kids will definitely look forward to it. Of course, you don’t need to let them make a mess all over the kitchen, but you can come up with creative ideas to make eating fruit and vegetables seem like a lot of fun. The most popular way of doing this is to create faces using the food, for example, you could use the tomatoes for eyes, carrots for a nose, and sliced cucumber for a mouth. Try new foods Your kids may be getting sick of the usual foods, so why not experiment and try out some different ones? Next time you go shopping, buy a few fruits and vegetables that you wouldn’t normally buy. Even better, take the kids with you and ask them what they would like to try. They will tell you what they think looks interesting and will be so excited to try it out for dinner! You can buy lots of fun foods, such as slices of ham and other meats in the shape of teddy bears and animals.

Give them snacks Buy some healthy snacks for your kids to eat between meals. There are lots of different foods available in the supermarkets, such as little packets of raisins, dried fruit, fresh fruit and mini crackers. Get the kids involved Instead of giving your kids cakes and chocolates for dessert, try replacing it with yogurts and fruit salads. Invite the kids to make it with you – they’ll be desperate to taste what they have made! Try to find some healthy recipes that children can make, as this will encourage them.  Apart from letting them make some of the food, helping out in the kitchen is a great thing for kids to do. Tell them to set the table before dinner and let them do some of the washing up afterwards. Will Kashis is a nutrition writer who freelances for niche publications and recently launched his site at www.Diets.md. He is also an editor for the official site of Eat Stop Eat diet program. < Previous Post Next Post >