You Are At: AllSands Home > Kids > Health > Promote healthy eating habits for your child
Sometimes it's hard for parents to make their children eat anything but junk food in this day and age. Children are constantly tempted by advertisements and the junk-food diets of friends to only eat fried, salty, sugary meals. We all know that this is bad for them, so here are some ways to counter-act the unhealthy diet so prevalent in our society today.

START YOUNG! When your little ones begin eating solid foods, don't give them anything fried or "junky." Only give them vegetables, healthy proteins and so on. At the toddler stage, they don't even need to know that fast-food restaurants exist.

BE CONSISTENT! Always, always give children healthy, good-for-them foods. If they don't like what you offer, give them a nutricious alternative. Let them choose. Either choice is good, right? Never give in and drive them to the pizza place or taco drive-through. Be strong. You are the parent, remember? If they go to bed hungry one night, they'll probably choose the healthy food the next night.

HEALTHY FOOD IS GOOD AND TASTY! Don't fall into our society's misconsception that healthy = yucky! That is untrue and you can teach this to your youngster as early as age three. You can brag to them how you know the secret that healthy food is tasty and no one else knows it. They'll get a kick out that, believe me.

MAKE FOOD FUN! Make the nutricious meals pretty and colorful. Make a smiley face out of a red bell pepper mouth and mushroom eyes. Get creative!

INVOLVE KIDS IN THE COOKING PROCESS! No matter what it is, if the child helps make it, it tastes wonderful. This concept sort of parallels the phenomenom of what I call "the gross breakfast in bed." Throughout time, children have created bizarre concoctions that they SWEAR are delicious for their innocent, sleepy parents. Just imagine if they had the right ingredients. They would feel like little professional chefs! Let them have their own little apron and chef hat or bandanna.

These are just a few of the ways to instill healthy eating habits in children. Another good way to make good foods that your children willl eat is by asking them, "If you could choose anything for me to make for dinner tonight that is NOT junk food, what would it be?" You'll be surprised at the answer!