Toddler Nutrition
Food ending up on the floor? Toddlers only wanting plain pasta and milk? Here are my top 12 tips to helping your little one eat well
Have a routine for meals and snacks- if there is a meal that your child is always struggling with, reflect on when and what they last ate. Is there a snack too close to meal time? A typical daily routine is breakfast, morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner and maybe another snack.
Share meals as a family- children who eat meals as a family are more likely to eat better, feel better about themselves, get along better with other people and do better in school! It's not only WHAT they are eating at the family table, but HOW. It's a time for people to learn how to behave at meal times, connect, and share stories and feelings from their day.
Lead by example- if your children see you eat what you have offered to them, they are more likely to try it. This also includes your behaviours around meal times.
Remove distractions- turn the TV off and make sure your child can focus on what they're doing. Eating is a learning experience
Toddlers regulate their own intake. Trust them to do that. Some days they're hungry, some days they're not. Just like you.
If kids are tired or sick, evenings can be harder. On these days, focus on getting a good meal in at lunch time when they're fresher, then perhaps some yoghurt or a sandwich will do them for dinner. It won't be the same every day.
A common mistake is offering milk or treat foods between meals that fills them up. Then they're not hungry for their main meals. If you are offering milk as a drink and your child is older than 12 months, make sure it's after their meal.
Keep offering- research says that children might need to be exposed to foods up to 15 times before they'll even try it. It's your job to offer. It's your child's job to explore, experiment and maybe try it.
Exposing children to vegetables at a young age is likely to increase the chances that they enjoy veggies as they grow older. This can include picture books about foods, involving them in the grocery shopping and preparing of the meal, and also offering them vegetables every day as part of meals.
Make food fun- you can name foods funny names that they relate to e.g. broccoli can be 'little trees' or you can make 'superhero rice' with veggies and chicken to make them 'grow and have energy to fly around'. You can also get creative with how you present the food like arranging cut up fruit to look like a face.
Watch your language- avoid labelling foods as 'good' or 'bad'
Don't use food as a reward e.g. "you can have sweets if you finish your veggies". This is implying that veggies are yuck and sweets are yum. Talk to them about why it's important to eat healthy foods but leave it up to them how much they want to eat.