Factors That Influence Your Child’s Health:

Nutrition

University Medical Center

Nutrition Services

Developing Proper Nutrition Habits Can Help

Your Child Lead A Healthier Lifestyle

You should make sure that your child eats breakfast as it sets

healthier nutrition habits throughout the day. Getting your child

to get the proper nutrition fulfillment can become difficult if your

child is a picky eater. Ask your child to taste everything you’ve

prepared even if they don’t eat. It takes seven to twelve times for a

child to try a new food before they will accept it. It is also a good

idea to stick to a schedule for meal and snack times. You should

not talk too much about calories, fat, or dieting with your child and

instead talk to them about a healthy lifestyle.

When thinking about what meals to prepare your child you

should consider using less fat, salt, and sugar in the dishes. There

are a few simple tips that can help you achieve this. One of these

tips is to use olive or canola oil instead of butter or margarine.

Instead of frying food items you should bake or roast them. You

can oven fry food instead of deep frying them to achieve the

crunch factor that kids love. In order to avoid your child from over

salting items, you should keep the salt shaker off of the table. It is

also a good idea to keep plenty of fruits and vegetables in the

fridge for kids to snack on instead of chips. In order to limit the

amount of sugar that your child receives you should choose cereals

that have a limited amount of sugar in them. You should avoid

oversized portions and make sure half of your child’s plate consist

of fruits and vegetables. For more information on this topic please

visit https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/health-

topic/weight-control/helping-your-child-tips-parents/Pages/

helping-your-child-tips-for-parents.aspx#c

Why is nutrition important for

children?

Getting your child to want to eat healthier

can be a challenge. However, it is a vital key

to making sure that your child leads a

healthy lifestyle. Poor nutrition habits over

time can lead to an increased risk of devel-

oping diabetes, heart disease, high blood

pressure, and high cholesterol, among other

Children ages four to eight need approxi-

mately 1,200 to 1,400 calories a day ac-

cording to the United States Department of

Agriculture. An important lesson to re-

member is that your child can eat anything

as long as it is in moderation. According to

the State of Obesity, Alabama’s obesity rate

in children ages two to four is 14.1% and it

ranks Alabama the 20th most obese states

of the forty-one states that were included.

An important lesson to remember is that

your child can eat anything as long as it is

moderation. While you can’t completely

control what your child is eating at school,

you can control what your child is given at

home. It is important to remember to feed

your child a variety of fruits and vegetables

as they provide all different types of vita-

mins and nutrients that are needed. An

easy way to remember this is to “feed your

child the rainbow”. Dark leafy greens such

as spinach and kale provide excellent

sources of iron and vitamin A which is

needed for eye sight development, among

other things. For more information please

visit https://fnic.nal.usda.gov/lifecycle-

nutrition/child-nutrition