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Healthy eating for your kid |
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Breakfast is an important meal. In many children the level of sugar in the blood can become too low if they fast for too long, and this will lead to poor concentration and irritability and it is not the best way to start the day, particularly at school. Breakfast can be easy to prepare: cereals for example, are a good way of getting child to have some milk.
Try and discourage snacks, but if a child really wants something to eat between meals, give him a savory snack such as a piece of cheese or some fresh fruit instead of something sweet. Sweets and biscuits contain almost pure sugar and this is a major cause of dental decay. They have the added disadvantage of containing a lot of concentrated calories which are not particularly filling, and so if your child is allowed an unlimited amount or eat them between meals, they can easily lead to excess weight gain. Similarly it makes sense to place mild restrictions on the amount of saturated fats (dairy products, fried foods and meat) in a child diet; eating large quantities of these foods can prove harmful and the sooner the children are introduced to healthy eating patterns the better as these patterns are likely to persist throughout life.
Over recent years there has been an increasing awareness that dietary fiber roughage is an important part of a person's diet. Diets low in fiber tend to be constipating. Children should therefore be provided with fruits and vegetables in their diet. If there is a tendency of constipation, higher fiber foods such as bran and wheat cereals may help to solve the problem in a natural way.
To sum up, provided children eat a varied diet with plenty of vegetables and fruits and not too much sugar or saturated fat, then they should be getting a healthy, balance diet.
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