Getting Children to Eat Vegetables!

Volunteering to serve meals to the children last weekend during a friend’s party was an eye opener for me. I found out that some children are as anti-vegetable as they are anti-bedtime or anti-homework. They come up with crafty ways to avoid "those slimy green things," like cleverly feeding them to the dog or sneaking them into a napkin to throw out later.

For most mothers it takes little extra effort to ensure that your kids are eating their vegetables. New research published in the journal Nutrition & Dietetics found that there are several effective ways to get kids to get veggies:

Eat Vegetables

This is just saying, model the healthful behaviour you want to see in your child. When kids see you eating healthful foods or even sitting down with them so you can enjoy healthful foods together, they're more likely to eat veggies themselves. So when you make nutritious choices, you're not only feeding yourself and boosting your own health, you're also helping your kids make healthful choices.

Involve Children in Food Preparation

Anytime you get kids involved in choosing or preparing food, you will satisfy their curiosity and fuel their interest in healthful foods. So take your kids to the market and let them pick out produce. Ask them to help measure ingredients, pick vegetables or stir a pot of soup (watching carefully, of course). Over time, they will develop a greater appreciation for nutritious meals.

Hold Tasting Parties

Buy a variety of colorful seasonal vegetables and encourage your kids to try them. You could make it even more fun by slicing veggies into cute shapes and using colorful plates and cutlery to build positive associations with vegetables.

Tell them the Benefits they can derive from Vegetables

Every child want to grow big or and one day become like mummy or daddy or some other characters they see in their cartoons. Letting them know that vegetables can help them achieve some of the pictures of the persons they imagine to become or resemble is a sure way of not only getting them to eat vegetables, also appreciating its nutritious values.

This is time to start trying out these tips because children develop their food and eating habits at a young age.