Eating is the most important thing in life. How can you cultivate a healthy body and civilized eating habits in your children? Here are 10 healthy and civilized ways to eat, suitable for both you and your child:
1. Happy Eating
A good pre-meal mood is an important measure for increasing a child's appetite. Whether the mood during the meal is pleasant is also the key to determining if the child will enjoy eating; do not force your child to eat often or scold them during meals, otherwise they will feel that eating is an annoying thing.
2. Delicious Food
Cooking skills need to be reviewed: after adding supplementary foods, change the styles and flavors frequently to let the child feel a sense of novelty about the food every day. Mothers who are not good at cooking can buy more children's recipe books to study at home.
3. Participatory Eating
Let the child participate in the preparation process: you can let the child spread jam or add salt themselves. Because of the sense of participation, they will enjoy the food they made. For example, before the meal, ask the child to help wipe the table, serve soup, mix seasonings, or introduce the dishes that are about to be served as gifts from their favorite person, and talk about their nutrition and taste.
4. Interval Eating
Adults sometimes lose their appetite due to emotions or the weather. If your child doesn't feel hungry at mealtime, don't force them to eat. Conversely, let them try again after a period of time: if your child dislikes a certain food, it may be just a temporary dislike, and you can try letting them eat it again after a while.
5. Substitution Eating
Learn the principle of substitution: although the types of food are different, their nutritional components can be substituted. If you really dislike certain foods, try to find substitute foods.
6. Supervised Eating
Avoid letting your child eat alone. Without parental guidance and supervision, they will generally pick and choose randomly, eating only what they think is tasty and ignoring other nutritious dishes; or they will eat a little, then play for a while, and some will even dump some of their food and pretend they have eaten it all.
7. Varied Eating
Varied eating fully reflects the principle of food complementation and is a guarantee for children to get various nutrients. You can start by eating 10 or 15 different kinds of food every day.
8. Slow Eating
Teach your child the habit of "chewing each mouthful 30 times and taking half an hour for a meal." This slow-eating method has multiple effects: brain-boosting, weight loss, beauty enhancement, and cancer prevention.
9. Plant-Based Eating
This originally meant "basically vegetarian," not eating no meat at all. This is also the original eating pattern determined by the structure of a young child's digestive system. A plant-based diet is a core measure for preventing modern diseases.
10. Early Eating
This means that all three meals should be early. For both children and adults, an early breakfast is the "intellectual switch" for the day; an early dinner can prevent more than ten diseases.