Food is an influential part of our lives and our children’s lives! The way we prepare food, celebrate with it and why we crave certain things is a part of our food culture.
Every family has a unique lifestyle, upbringing, and heritage that influences the way they celebrate and experience life. One huge aspect of every culture and every life includes food. Every family has a unique food culture, and it is important for a child’s proper development that your family’s food culture is a healthy one!
Food culture is passed down from parents to children and is largely formed through attitudes and reactions to food, so forming a healthy food culture for your family means expressing positive attitudes to healthy foods – not just sugary or salty ones. This means ignoring society’s food culture, which may influence children through their interactions with advertising, television, and movies.
Creating A Positive Food Culture
To create a positive food culture, education is essential. Teach your children about where their food comes from and how it is produced, what’s in season and what produce is native to your region. This could mean bringing them on trips to farms or farmers market, teaching them to garden, or explaining things at the grocery store.
Cook food with your children! Cooking food from scratch allows children to develop healthy attitudes toward food because it teaches them how it is made. It also prevents them from being picky as they have control over what they are consuming when they know everything that goes into their food. Plus, it’s a great life skill to start developing!
Eat together. When you eat together, you are showing that your attitude toward food is a positive one. It brings your family together and ensure it’s not rushed, to show that there is a certain reverence for mealtime.
At Childventures, we strive to foster positive attitudes toward food by having children eat together, by providing healthy choices, and by teaching children about different aspects of nutrition. Be sure to check our comprehensive curriculum and nutrition program out!
