A common concern we hear from pre-kindergarten parents after the holidays is “My child never sat at the table once to complete a meal” or “She hates her vegetables, or “How do you get her to finish her breakfast?”. The simple answer to that question is that we don’t. When children are surrounded by their friends and groups they wish to be a part of, they naturally “Follow the leader”, hence, meal time will see one child leading the rest of them to do the same. They compete against each other to finish their meals first, they talk and discuss their specials and favourites and you may even see them pecking into their neighbours lunch box.
At home things are different from when he is at Jumeirah day care. Your child will need to keep himself entertained or be entertained by you, or he may require his favourite cartoon to complete his snack. A common problem that parents face, is that they are unable to get their child to eat everything they have been served. A worry that they are not getting all the nutrients by leaving portions could be justified but there is also a good explanation for why this happens. When we serve ourselves, we generally require larger portions of everything. For instance if dinner meant a chicken breast, boiled vegetables and mash potatoes, you may be inclined to reduce the boiled vegetable and mash potatoes servings by a small amount but leave the whole chicken breast on the plate.
Children have much smaller tummies and therefore the appetite is also a lot less than what an adult would have. In this case, your toddler may finish the chicken, but have no room left for his vegetables, which to his advantage he does not like anyway. To have him finishing everything on his plate and enjoy a balanced meal, you have to decrease the portions of all items that you serve him. May be cut the chicken in half, reduce mash potatoes into a third of the portion and half the boiled vegetables.
If he still doesn’t finish his meal, it might because a child’s tummy is about the size of his clenched fist, so he may have to take breaks before actually being able to eat everything served. Taking breaks is healthy for children, as they get more nutrition when portions are left to a manageable amount for digestion.
Children are constantly in a love-hate relationship with vegetables and fruits. Sometimes its all they eat all day long, and sometimes they don’t want to go near a plate that has vegetables on it. Children are trying to state their ground, and they may refuse vegetables to be in control or prove independence. In this case the oldest trick in the book is to trick them into having their daily servings of vegetables. One recipe could be to grate carrot and or finely cut herbs and mix it in with cakes or cream cheese, call it rainbow cheese. Another way to make sure they get their daily surviving of fruit, would be to make popsicles out of fresh juice at home. If your child is already biting on ice cubes, turn fruit juice into ice cubes instead.
In general, children need a lot less nutrition than adults do, and there’s chances are that he is eating what he needs in smaller portions. To make sure he is getting all the nutrients his body needs, plan out the weeks meals to include a little bit of everything, and the chances are that your toddler is doing just fine.
