Are you over-feeding your kids?
They simply don’t need as much food as many parents think they may. While traditional values promote three balanced meals a day, in our snack culture, kids often eat way too many snacks on top of the three meals they are served and can’t possibly be expected to deliver you a happy plate at meal time.
A lot of parents who think they have picky eaters just have kids who snack too much.
While most parents today ate an average of one daily snack growing up, today’s kids eat three — and it’s not three helpings of healthy snacks, it’s chips or cookies or cakes. A study from the University of North Carolina found that high-sugar and high-fat processed snacks (like cookies, chips, and crackers) account for 28 percent of 2- to 6-year-olds’ diets and 35 percent of 7- to 12-year-olds’.
So monitor your kids’ snack intake. When kids get home from school, they are hungry and want to eat. When they are bored, they want to eat. Have healthy snacks on hand but also remember a rule that can help you at home:
Cut off high-calorie snacking two hours prior to serving any meal so they won’t push the healthy food you provide around on their plates so much, says the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.