Build Healthy Eating Habits In Your Kid With These Easy Yet Effective Tips

Unhealthy eating habits can lead to health problems in kids, so it's important to switch to healthy habits to keep diseases at bay. Here's how you can incorporate healthy eating habits in your kids.

As said by Frederick Douglass, "It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men". Indeed, building a healthy generation from childhood equals building a healthy nation for the future. Adopting healthy food habits and keeping the body active are key factors for raising super-heroes.

Let's have a look at "healthy food habits" that you can opt for while raising your munchkin. Being the best source of nutrition, good food, boosts immunity, health, strength & endurance but wait, it is not only about quality food but also the way to consume the same which is equally important.

How Developing Healthy Habits Help Your Child To Grow Mentally?

As we all know, much of the mental growth of a child happens to be within 0-5 years of age. Proper growth of height, weight & strength is proportional to adequate consumption of vitamins, calcium, protein etc.

Nowadays, children's food habits are becoming a stress factor for parents. Most popular and yummy food items children love are noodles, chips, bakery items, sours & sweets. Such food items are helpful for moms in the "tiffin filling" task, but they make the child prone to tooth decay, intestinal worms, and childhood obesity.

Ways To Incorporate Healthy Eating Habits

Here are some ways to build healthy eating habits in your child:

Be smart with snacks

Moms can instead load their child's snack tiffin with fruits (banana, pomegranate & seasonal fruits), groundnuts along with jaggery, black raisins, dates, figs & dry fruits. Replacing bad dietary habits with healthy ones will go a long way in achieving a robust constitution.

Choose freshly prepared food

Children should eat freshly prepared food instead of canned & preservative added foods like jams or canned fruit pulps. One must get a wide variety of vegetables, fruits & pulses in the diet. Eggs & fish have proven to be good sources of proteins for children. Insufficient nutritional intake, particularly of iron with high consumption of fat and added sugars are known to be associated with poor school performance and metabolic diseases. Chyavanprash is one of the best ayurvedic supplements for growth.

Make healthy food more fun

To encourage healthy food habits make it fun for children. Fill their plates with the colours of carrots, beetroot, maize, berries, and green leafy veggies. Make different shapes while preparing food. Include food with different textures, consistency, and mouthfeel. Make your food attractive for a child.

The best gift to offer a growing child is training his taste buds with different flavours and tastes. Encourage your child to try and sample different nutritious food items. Do not forget to praise your munchkin when he/she curiously tries something new.

Help them eat mindfully

Educate your child to listen to their tummy. Sometimes being over-cautious, concerning their child's health, parents try to feed them excessively. Make a habit to sit at the table and eat mindfully. Yes, I am asking you to avoid screentime when a child is having a meal. It helps to avoid overeating, snacking, and grazing.

All these are easy ways to turn a child's dietary habits to a healthier level and build a strong base for a healthy life ahead.

(The article is contributed by Dr Sachin Rohani, Ayurvedic expert, Lexicon Institute of Hotel Management)