Healthy lifestyle - Feeding your children for school
Published:Saturday | September 4, 2010 | 12:00 AM
Heather Little-White, Contributor
As a parent, you may be experiencing difficulty in getting your children to eat healthily, especially during schooltime when the lunch box poses a challenge.
Sarah Bronson, eHow.com contributor, posits that as a parent, you may face the dilemma of how to send off a healthy lunch - one with complex carbohydrates, calcium, protein, fruits and vegetables - that your child will actually eat, rather than bringing it back home or - worse - trading it for more sugary fare.
As you grapple with back-to-school, are you comfortable with what your child will eat during schooltime? To determine your progress with what you are doing in providing healthy school meals, answer the questions in the checklist below.
SELF-TEST
- What is school lunch like at your child's school?
- Does school lunch need to be reformed?
- Do you pack lunch for your children, and what do you pack?
- Do you write notes in your children's lunch boxes and what do you write?
- What are some of your children's favourite lunch recipes?
- What are some great beverages for your children?
- What traditional food items do you make to improve the nutrition of your children?
- How much time do your children take for lunch?
BALANCED MEALS
An important factor in planning meals for children at school is to ensure balance. The key points to remember:
- Make meals exciting so your children will eat them.
- Introduce nutritious foods from the first day so it becomes a way of life.
- Incorporate nutritious ingredients in foods they love, for example, add vegetables to macaroni and cheese.
- Provide a variety of meals to prevent boredom.
BREAKFAST IS ESSENTIAL
A balanced breakfast is essential for a good start to your child's day.
Fruit smoothies are exciting and children can travel and drink. Serve fresh juice to add minerals and vitamins and be careful not to serve processed sugars as they do not provide sustained energy throughout the morning.
LUNCH IS A MUST
Lunch should be packed with nutrient-rich foods prepared in a way that children will enjoy it. This will prevent them from seeking out foods with 'empty calories'. Lunch should include servings of fruit and raw vegetables with low-fat dressing. Integrate calcium-rich foods like cheese and milk. Use dried fruit like raisins and prunes. Like breakfast, limit the amounts of refined sugars served with the meal.
DINNER
Children need vegetables. To make dinner light, add vegetables, purée them and add to soups. Serve proteins in moderate portions, baking, rather than frying.
SANDWICHES
Sandwiches are easy to make and it is easy to pack them with nutrition, especially when you use wholegrain breads instead of white. Avoid sugary fillings like jam and jelly spread and stick with peanut butter, fresh meat, tuna and egg. Leftover chicken or casserole can be placed in a pita bread or wrap. Add lettuce or tomato to spruce up presentation and quality.
PICKY EATERS
When your child only eats a few foods, you know that mealtime may not always be the best time for him or her. Adults talk about food as if they are easy to eat, but children often don't think the same way. For the problem eater, mealtime sucks!
How can you tell if your child is a picky eater? Apart from only eating one or two favourite foods, picky eaters will accept new foods on their plate and will be willing to try them. With smaller stomachs, children may not eat much in one sitting, but will eat often. The problem is, children are not only notoriously picky eaters but they will fight for sugary junk food.
Parents should make interesting and nutritious meals and snacks for their children to ensure that they get at least one-third of their daily calories from school meals and after-school snacks.
IDENTIFYING PICKY EATERS
According to Iowa State University, picky eaters:
- Will eat less than 30 different foods;
- Will eat one or more foods from each type of food texture;
- Will have one favourite food that they will eat consistently, then may burn out and not eat that food, but after two
weeks will resume eating it. - Will accept new foods on their plate and willingly touch or try new foods.
- Will eat a new food after being exposed to it at least 10 times.
Most picky eaters get enough calories per day to maintain healthy weight and growth. Picky eaters can be managed at home without too much difficulty.
FEEDING THEPICKY EATER
The majority of picky eaters will gradually expand their diet to include a greater variety of foods if these suggestions are implemented.
- Offer the child a variety of foods each day.
- Offer consistent set mealtimes each day.
- Make mealtimes pleasant.
- Limit the child's juice intake to 4-6oz per day.
- Limit the child's snacks to two or three healthy snacks per day.
SMOOTHIES
Any child can hardly resist fruit smoothies, which are naturally sweet and can be an excellent way to sneak good nutrition into their diet.
If you make the smoothies at home, use fresh fruit such as ripe bananas and fruits in season like mangoes, plain yoghurt and low-fat milk for a healthy source of calcium and protein. For added fibre and protein, powdered supplements, nuts and grains may be included in the smoothie.
Banana Boat Smoothie
2 ripe bananas
1/2 cup of orange juice
1/2 cup of vanilla yoghurt
16oz of pineapple juice
4 cubes ice
Peel bananas and place in blender. Add orange juice. Add vanilla yoghurt. Next add pineapple juice then add ice. Blend for 30 seconds. Enjoy a refreshing smoothie!
Source: www.easy-kids-recipes.com.
SAY CHEESE
Cheese is a good source of protein and calcium and it is versatile in the preparation of meals and snacks. Grilled cheese sandwich is popular with children, as is cheese and crackers, which is also a filling snack.
Bread, butter and Cheddar cheese sandwich
Here's a way to make this classic sandwich in a non-stick pan.
Ingredients:
4 slices white bread
2 slices Cheddar cheese
3 tbsps butter, divided
Method:
Preheat skillet over medium heat. Generously butter one side of a slice of bread. Place bread, buttered-side down, on to skillet bottom and add 1 slice of cheese. Butter a second slice of bread on one side and place, buttered-side up, on top of sandwich. Grill until lightly browned and flip over; continue grilling until cheese is melted. Repeat with remaining 2 slices of bread, butter and slice of cheese.
Source: Allrecipes.com
Heather Little-White, PhD, is a nutrition and lifestyle consultant in the Corporate Area. Send comments to editor@gleanerjm.com or fax 922-6223.
Feeding your children for school
HEALTHY HINT:
- For the healthy version of grilled cheese sandwiches, coat your pan or sandwich press with non-stick cooking spray instead of butter and use wholewheat bread in lieu of white.
- Parents should realise that with a little creativity and nutrition considerations, it is possible to get children to eat nutritious lunches, whether they know it or not.