“Multi-sensory learning” is involving all the senses in the process. When kids have chores in the kitchen, touch, sight, smell, and sound are part of their learning experience. Kids used to help plant, water, weed, and then harvest a summer garden. Kids would help prepare the food for storage, then in the making of meals, and the eventual clean-up. Before every home had a dishwasher, kids not only set the table, but did all the dishes.

When I was growing up I had two best friends, who lived in my neighborhood, Kathy and Debbie. Kathy’s mom was extremely fastidious and her home was always immaculate. We seldom ventured inside Kathy’s house and then it was only with trepidation.

On the other hand, Debbie was the oldest girl of five children. There was always something going on at her house. I was often invited over for dinner.

Wyatt loves to help his dad bring in the groceries and this melon smells so yummy!

Debbie and her brothers took turns helping their mom with the meals. Looking back, I’m amazed at how much time I spent at her house. Because I was there so much, I’d be helping right along with them.

Multi-Sensory Learning Vital for the Picky Eater
Families are divorced from the land where food is grown. We no longer appreciate the work it takes to grow, harvest, and then prepare the food. Often mom doesn’t really cook. So why should kids be expected to help with preparing meals? Cooking is an excellent activity, which will help your picky eater appreciate once-refused foods. Each food has unique colors, textures, smells, and tastes. Each food is different and different is fun! Cooking is a hands-on experience.

There is a great sense of accomplishment with meal preparation. Most parents will occasionally bake sweets with their children. This is a helpful task to learn how to measure, but most kids don’t need any encouragement to eat cookies or cupcakes. Parents will often allow their kids to make boxed foods, like macaroni and cheese. This, again, only promotes the consumption of highly processed foods.

Meal prep in your kitchen is the perfect setting to talk about various healthful ingredients. What’s the texture? What color is it? Who likes to eat this? What does it taste like? What’s the food smell like? How does it benefit your body (carrots help our eyes, broccoli prevents cancer, etc.)

A Picky Eater Is Never Too Young
Helping in the kitchen is a natural method to include multi-sensory learning, no matter how old your child is. Children experience a great sense of accomplishment when they master simple cooking skills. There’s a greater desire to taste a new food or to eat a once-refused food, if your child has helped in its preparation.

1) A toddler can help carry unbreakable items to the table. They can help to wash fruit and veggies with a soft veggie brush. They can spread cream cheese, nut butters, and jelly on sandwiches with plastic-ware. Mix ingredients. Peel bananas. Shuck corn. Tear lettuce.

2) A preschooler can help set and clear the table. Toss things in the trash. Identify and bring items within reach from the pantry. Help measure ingredients. Break eggs into a bowl with assistance. Make sandwiches. Toss salads (Not just lettuce, either. Try cauliflower and broccoli salad.). Serve herself/himself.

3) Grade school children can set and clear the table by themselves. Wash and dry the dishes. Help make a grocery list and help you shop. They can read the nutrition label and identify ingredients on it. Use the blender. Make simple recipes with assistance. Make salads. Peel potatoes. Make a fruit smoothie in a blender.

For info about the free Baby Bites Ezine, Click Here.

For a synopsis of Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater, Click Here.

You can transform your picky eater into a healthy eater, if you:

Don’t Buck Nature
Kids prefer to eat with their hands. This gives them multi-sensory experiences, which they need while learning to enjoy whole foods. Let babies eat with their hands. That is how they discover all the attributes of food.

Incorporate as many finger foods as possible for older toddlers. Finger foods make ideal meals for kids since you can combine a variety of small portions on one plate. Tiny baby peas are fun to pick up from the highchair tray. Grated carrots and other veggies and fruit make interesting first-finger food.

For preschoolers, try partnering baked chicken fingers (stay away from prepackaged fried nuggets) with vitamin-rich green beans and sliced baked sweet potatoes for a nutritious meal that’s easy to eat with your hands.

Kids love to dip. So, incorporate healthy dips: mashed avocados, hummus, and yogurt (sweetened with mashed bananas or peaches) for dipping apples, carrot, celery, and veggie sticks.

Even babies like Katelyn can feed themselves.

Offer Only Whole Foods
Avoid the temptation to feed your baby processed foods. If your baby has never had a chip, French fry, or any fast food, he/she won’t miss them. Of course, avoiding junk foods yourself is important because your baby is watching you.

Moms often tell me that their preschoolers refuse to eat anything, but junk foods. Why is that? If you didn’t eat junk food and they were not in the house, the only food your child will eat will be whole, nutritious foods.

What you eat is what your baby will eat. According to the CDC, U.S, adults consuming vegetables are far short of the recommendation 3 servings a day. The time to begin to eat healthy is now. Children naturally eat whole foods, when you eat them and they are only offered whole foods.

Have Fun
Children learn through play. Giving fun, creative names to everyday nutritious foods makes mealtime more fun. According to a 2009 Cornell University study, when kids were offered “X-ray vision carrots” instead of plain carrots, they ate 62 percent more carrots. Come up with silly names for whole foods, such as “cloud fluff” for mashed potatoes or “cheese in the trees” for broccoli florets topped with cheese.

Two adorable creatures incorporated in my books, Baby Betty Bites^® and Try Rannosaurus^®, transform dreaded mealtimes into fun times. They teach your child that all food is yummy–especially the green variety. They bring fun to the table, while challenging your child to eat nutritious foods. When you include Try and Betty in your mealtimes, your child will discover the attributes of healthful foods. Try and Betty always eat nutritious foods and when you include them at the table they affirm the goodness of yummy whole foods.

Try loves to say, “Green food is yummy!” Betty is an encourager, saying things like, “Mangia bene” (eat well) and “Bravo” for a job well done. You can find out more about these two characters in my books, Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater and the children’s storybook, The Forest Feast. (Click here for a synopsis of both books.)

CLICK HERE for the Baby Bites Store.

For info about the free Baby Bites Ezine,  CLICK HERE

Children with ASD are usually picky eaters, preferring the very foods that make their problems worse. Many parents consider their kids with ASD as “slow feeders” and “difficult to feed” as infants. In the new study, experts found by their first birthday, kids with ASD diets were considerably less varied, eating fewer vegetables and fruits, but they also consumed less food overall.

Not all picky eaters have ASD, but most children with ASD are picky eaters, because of their over-responsiveness to tactile sensations. They many times will eat a limited number of foods, and may completely avoid certain textures and food groups. It’s no wonder they’re picky eaters as acceptance of different textures is vital for a healthy eater.

Amy thinks the new study about picky eating
and ASD is interesting.

Besides looking at persistence picky eating as an early sign of ADS, experts reported these kids were not malnourished.  Experts need to look beyond a child being “malnourished.” Kids with ADS improve when their immune systems are supported and improved.

Jaquelyn McCandless, M.D., author of  Children with Staving Brains, says that ASD is a complex biomedical illness resulting in “significant brain malnutrition.” There’s emerging evidence that, once nutritional concerns have been addressed, children with ASD improve at some level. While the nutritional treatment will vary, there seems to be agreement that all children with ASD improve with diets free from refined sugar, white flour, and food additives. In addition, they may benefit from probiotics, cod liver oil and vitamin D.

Because kids with ASD are picky eaters, getting over the picky eating hurdle is the first step to improving their health. Parents of children with ASD have seen remarkable improvement using the Baby Bite Steps, especially when combined with improving “gut dysfunction.” The Baby Bite Steps uses positive reinforcement, while engaging a picky eater in directed-play. This conditions a positive response to various food textures and flavors. Adjust your timetable for kids with ASD. Consistency and praising your child for small steps are even more vital for a child with ASD.

Click Here for the Baby Bites Store.

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The Forest Feast is a whole foods storybook. The characters, Try Rannosaurus® and Betty Baby Bites^TM, love to eat whole foods, especially veggies. Naturally, reading the story again and again will reinforce this concept.

Your child doesn’t have to be a “picky eater” to benefit from The Forest Feast. Children are constantly bombarded with messages about junk foods. Advertisers target children with commercials for sugary breakfast foods, fast foods, and candy. Today, all children need positive reinforcement that whole foods are yummy.

The concepts in The Forest Feast are enhanced when you incorporate the story with fun activities. If you are a primary school or preschool teacher these activities are easily incorporated into a classroom experience. The most effective multi-sensory experiences for children will be with real food and parents have the edge over teachers on having their children help with cooking.

While reading the story, encourage your children to say with Try Rannosaurus^® “Green food is yummy!” Auditory learning is vital. When children think and say positive words about veggies, they’re beginning the journey to healthy eating.

Be sure to discuss the food you’re highlighting when involved in one of the food activities below: its texture, its aroma, its taste, its goodness and how it helps the body.

Aiden says “Green food is yummy,” like Try Rannosaurus®.

First, read The Forest Feast to your children, then pick an activity:

1) Food on a Plate
Provide pictures of whole foods from supermarket circulars and magazine photos. Have the children glue them to a paper plate. If children are older than 4, they may cut out the photos themselves using safety scissors.

2)  Healthy Food or Junk Food?
Give your children paper plates or a piece of construction paper with a line drawn down the middle with a marker. Write HEALTHY on one side and JUNKY on the other side. Cut out pictures of junk foods like donuts, cookies, and potato chips, and pictures of whole foods, like vegetables and whole grains from newspapers and magazines. Have your kids glue their photos to t he appropriate side of the plate.

3)  A is for Apple… V is for Veggie
Provide your children pictures of whole foods and show them how to write the appropriate letter of the alphabet which corresponds to the food. I’ve offered (below) other whole food words for the letters which do not match to a fruit or veggie. You’ll want to be sure that there are more veggies in your list than fruit. The challenge for more children is eating vegetables, not fruit. Ask the children, ”Would Try Rannosaurus® would eat this?” and “Why?” Which veggies would be his favorite? Green veggies, of course. Discuss the textures, tastes, and how yummy each veggie or fruit smells.

Fruit: apple, banana, cherry, fig, grapes, kiwi, lemon, mango, nectarine, orange, pear, strawberry and watermelon.

Vegetables: asparagus, broccoli, carrot, dandelion (yes this is edible), eggplant, horseradish, kale, lettuce, mushroom, okra, peas, radish, spinach, turnips, watercress, yams and zucchini.

Other Whole Food Words for the Alphabet: eggs, julienne (to cut in thin strips), honey, vegetable, quinoa (a seed, not a grain, often eaten as a breakfast) and unleavened (without yeast or baking powder)

4) What Food is This?
After reading The Forest Feast to your children, have them guess the food in a picnic basket or cloth shopping bag. Prepare laminated pictures of whole foods or use plastic play food. Of course real fruit and veggies is best. Say “In my picnic basket/shopping bag I have some fruit. It is a red and it’s a berry. What kind of food is it?” Give the children a moment to guess, then take the item from the basket and show them a strawberry. Discuss the textures, tastes, and how yummy each food smells as you pass around the produce.

Another method for this activity is to blindfold a child (or have them close their eyes). Then place have them put their hands in the grocery bag or picnic basket. Have them describe what they are feeling and then guess what it is.

5) Genesis Connection
In discussions about whole foods and the forest animals, read Genesis 1, especially verses 11 and 12 (God created the vegetation) and 24 (God created the animals). Talk about how vegetation was designed to keep our bodies strong and healthy. For additional discussion about dinosaurs read Job 40:15-21. What is a Behemoth? He eats grass. He is very strong like bronze and iron. He is extremely big and his tail is as large as a tree. What animal does that sound like? Click Here for more information on dinosaurs in the Bible.

6) Veggie Dip
Prepare Julienne strips of veggies (carrots, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, etc.) with either a hummus or avocado dip. Ask the children if Try Rannosaurus® would eat this. Why? Which veggies would be his favorite? Give each child a small paper plate with each of the veggies and a dollop of dip. Discuss the textures, tastes, and how yummy each veggie smells.

7) Fruit and Vegetable Prints
Materials Needed:
Paint or ink (to make tempera paint thicker and stickier add a touch of flour or glue).
Sponges
An old cookie tray or Styrofoam tray.
Paintbrushes
Water and water containers.
Paper and a covered work area.
Fruits and veggies of all kinds: carrots, starfruit, mushrooms, cauliflower, broccoli, peppers, avocados, and apples.

Method:
1) Cut the fruit and veggies (an adult should do this).
2) Dip them into paint or printing ink and stamp them onto paper in random or ordered patterns. Kinder artists may instead apply the paint or ink directly to the vegetables with a paintbrush. It’s a good idea to put the paint on a sponge so that when an object is dipped into the paint, the sponge will only let off a little bit of paint… a little is all you need.

For info about the free Baby Bites Ezine, CLICK HERE.

CLICK HERE for ordering information for The Forest Feast.

Healthy eating is encouraged when all the senses are used. When introducing healthful foods to any child, especially a picky eater, you’ll want to have them help prepare the food. Learning to eat nutritious foods is a process, in which all the senses must be engaged. This is called multi-sensory learning.

Parents expect taste alone should be enough when introducing new foods to their child. It doesn’t matter if you’re four or forty, multi-sensory learning works. Once a picky eater’s senses are engaged, she’ll be on the road to healthy eating. Auditory learning is essential and discussing the meal is vital. Keep the conversation about the food positive. “What color is broccoli? Green food is yummy! Is the broccoli smooth or rough?” What does is smell like? Surprisingly, the last sense to incorporate is taste.

Most picky eaters need to be taught how to enjoy whole foods. One of the easiest ways to accomplish this is through meal prep. To avoid food battles, make mealtime a learning experience. Whenever possible engage your child’s senses with food preparation.
Angel is old enough to learn how to use a knife.

Children are like sponges as they soak up everything around them. Encourage your picky eater to appreciate once-refused foods. Not only will meal preparation give a child multi-sensory experiences, but the will have a sense of ownership in the food prepared.

Multi-sensory learning is the foundation of the Baby Bite Steps. In fact, in about a week, after the implementation of the Baby Bite Steps, even the most food-resistant child will pick up and eat a formerly refused food.

Even a toddler can help with various aspects of food preparation. A toddler can peel bananas, mix ingredients, and tear lettuce. Preschoolers can help measure ingredients, break eggs into a bowl, use a plastic knife to cut soft fruit and cheese, make sandwiches and toss salads. Older children can learn to make simple recipes like pancakes, make salads, and use blenders, hand mixers and the microwave.

My new storybook, The Forest Feast release is mid-November. You’ll save shipping and handling when you pre-order. When the parenting book, Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater, is purchased with The Forest Feast, you’ll save even more! Click Here for ordering information.

For info about the free Baby Bites Ezine, CLICK HERE.
 

Dr. John Medina says in his book, “Brain Rules,” that multi-sensory learning is powerful. He states, “Extra information given at the moment of learning makes learning better.”

This is especially important information for parents of picky eaters, who inadvertently reinforce the wrong concepts.

Repetition is basic for memory. Have you ever had to memorize a  poem, the Ten Commandments, or a part in a play? You repeat, repeat, and repeat, until the information is placed in your memory.

Pictured: Angel is helping with dinner. Helping mom in the kitchen incorporates multi-sensory learning.

Parents often enforce the one-bite rule: one bite is required of a refused food, like spinach. They think their picky eater will eventually come around to liking spinach. All they are doing is reinforcing that some food tastes sooo yucky, only one bite is required.

Although, repetition is important, all the senses contribute to the learning process. Medina says when repetition is combined with other senses, learning is increased.

Medina asks, “What if we introduced information as a multi-sensory experience, and then repeated not only the information, but also one of the modes of presentation? The first re-exposure might be presented visually, for example; the next auditorily; the third, kinesthetically…And let’s not continue to neglect our other senses…touch and smell are capable of making powerful contributions to the learning process.”

And that’s exactly what happens when a parent incorporates the Baby Bite Steps into a child’s mealtime experience. The steps are repeated during the course of a week. Each step stimulates a different sense during mealtimes, which moves the picky eater toward tasting and then eating a refused food.

Beginning with touch, sight, and hearing the attributes of a refused food are explored by the child. The sense of smell and taste are added last, after the child has had an opportunity to experience and learn about the physical attributes of the food. Each child will advance at his own speed, but the steps are designed so that he’ll become a healthy eater.

I was happy to see a molecular biologist found that when more senses were stimulated, learning was enhanced. This confirms the foundation of multi-sensory learning incorporated in my Baby Bite steps. Even picky eaters can learn to enjoy whole foods, by stimulating more senses.

Most likely, when introducing a new food you’ve said “This is yummy!” and then smacked your lips in enjoyment, expecting your picky eater to take a bite. Take it a step further, discuss the food: what it tastes like, the texture, the color, and how it smells. Don’t expect that much of it will be eaten at the first introduction. Make it a point of conversation during dinner. For example, how is broccoli good for you? Where does it grow? Who likes to eat it? Enjoy eating it yourself.

Once picky eaters incorporate all their senses in a positive environment, learning to enjoy whole nutritious foods isn’t so difficult after all. Learning opens the door to new adventures. When incorporating all the senses during meals, the transformation to a healthy eater moves along very quickly. In about seven days with the Baby Bite steps, a picky eater will be tasting new foods…on his own!

Buy the book Baby Bites, CLICK HERE.

Read more about how we learn, CLICK HERE.

For info about the free Baby Bites Ezine, CLICK HERE.

She says, “New studies, however, demonstrate that babies and very young children know, observe, explore, imagine and learn more than we would ever have thought possible. In some ways, they are smarter than adults.”

Avah is learning how kitchen things work.

“Babies are captivated by the most unexpected events. Adults, on the other hand, focus on the outcomes that are the most relevant to their goals. Children play with the objects that will teach them the most. (Italics mine) In our study, 4-year-olds imagined new possibilities based on just a little data. Adults rely more on what they already know. Babies aren’t trying to learn one particular skill or set of facts; instead, they are drawn to anything new, unexpected or informative.”

She continues, “Part of the explanation for these differing approaches can be found in the brain. The young brain is remarkably plastic and flexible. Brains work because neurons are connected to one another, allowing them to communicate. Baby brains have many more neural connections than adult brains. But they are much less efficient. Over time, we prune away the connections we don’t use, and the remaining ones become faster and more automatic. Moreover, the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that controls the directed, planned, focused kind of intelligence, is exceptionally late to mature, and may not take its final shape until our early 20s.”

Children play to learn, especially toddlers and preschool children. As adults, we tend to forget that playing for children is learning. We also forget that eating healthful foods is a learning process, one that we must teach. The new research on how children learn reinforces the steps to healthy eating explained in Baby Bites^TM, “Through play, your little tyke rehearses all that’s experienced in her life. In fact, play is a child’s work. Therefore, it’s an important element in transforming your picky eater into a healthy eater. Through directed-play with Try Rannosaurus^TM and Betty Baby Bites^TM, she’ll become accustomed to various textures, tastes, and smells. Your child will eagerly come to accept once-refused foods.”

When you and your picky eater include Try and Betty during mealtimes, they will give you multiple opportunities to positively reinforce healthy eating habits. Both characters are quick to encourage your picky eater. Betty has a very tiny voice. She often squeaks, encouraging words like “Bravo” and “Fantastico.” Try with his big bold voice says, “Green food is yummy” and “I’m so hungry I could eat a tree!”

Try and Betty will encourage your picky eater to appreciate once-refused foods, which have unique colors, textures, smells, and tastes. Each food is different and different is fun! For a synopsis of Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater, Click Here.

For info about the FREE Baby Bites Ezine, Click Here.

Listen to today’s podcast, Click Here.

Families with home vegetable gardens eat more fruit and vegetables. The home garden supplies fresh fruit and vegetables and at the same time saves grocery dollars. A garden gives over a 20-fold increase in the value of the produce grown compared to the initial cost.

Nicole loves to help in the garden.

Most kids don’t see a veggie until it appears on their plate!

Gardening is a wonderful family project. Gardening improves overall health by providing exercise, stress reduction, relaxation, and quality time with your children.

All kids love digging in the dirt and gardening allows kids to learn about food, without the pressure of eating it the first time it’s seen. Even toddlers can help to plant, water, weed, and harvest. Gardening involves all the senses. When children, especially picky eaters, help in the garden, it gives them “ownership” of the produce. It should be no surprise that studies have shown that gardening is directly related to the frequency of vegetable consumption.

Vegetables begin to lose nutrients from the minute they are picked. Most fruit and veggies will last five to seven days in your refrigerator, but the longer you have them the less nutrition is available. It only stands to reason, when you eat veggies picked from your garden, not only will the taste be improved, but so will the nutrition.

We live on a half acre so you’d think I’d have a vegetable garden, but the deer eat everything in sight. Years ago, when my girls were young, I had a garden. Since then, the deer have moved back into our neighborhood.

Someone forgot to tell the deer about the perennials they aren’t supposed to eat. Daylilies are on the list of flowers that “deer won’t eat.” I have yet to see a flower. Just as the buds are ready to open, they’re gobbled up.

Gardens are an open invitation for deer to come to dinner. I might as well put up a neon sign, “All You Can Eat.” My neighbors on either side have erected fences to keep the deer out of their gardens. I keep talking about purchasing a green house, but every year I put it off.

You don’t need a big backyard, or a yard at all, to grow vegetables. There are a lot of vegetables and herbs that do well in containers on decks, apartment balconies, or even in windowsills. For the time being, my garden is on my deck. Although, I don’t have as many veggies as my neighbors, I manage to grow peppers, tomatoes, eggplant, and herbs.

Zach is watering the plants on my deck.

So how does your garden grow?
The children in these photos are my grandchildren. (It helps to have built-in models.) I often use pictures that moms send me of their kids with my blogs. I’d love to post photos of your children in your garden showing off your produce. Email photos to info@babybites.info. 

For info about the FREE Baby Bites Ezine, Click Here.

Listen to today’s podcast, Click Here.

For a synopsis of Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater, Click Here.

This is a growing concern. Experts tell us this generation is the first not expected to live as long as their parents.

Children, today, grow up eating highly process foods loaded with chemicals. Often the first finger food for baby is a fast food French fry cooked in trans fat and flavored with MSG! The average number of vegetables kids eat a day is one…and that’s when French fries and ketchup are counted as vegetables!

Eating black olives from the tips of your fingers is fun!
Leah has no idea that learning to love whole foods involves all the senses. 

5 Simple Strategies:

1. Involve Your Picky Eater
The pickier the eater, the more engaged they need to be in the process of preparing food. Involve your child at every stage of food prep. Begin with grocery shopping. Have your toddler hold an item from the produce department, while you’re shopping in the store. Give older children a job to do, such as reading the nutrition facts on labels. Then get your kids involved not only in setting the table, but in meal preparation and serving. Kids love to cook. Appoint your picky eater as your under-chef. Adjust the task to your child’s age. Even toddlers can help wash vegetables, assemble sandwiches, spread nut butters and cream cheese with plastic-ware, place veggies on top of pizza, and help stir ingredients. Older kids can peel and then mash cooked potatoes, prepare salads and simple recipes.

2. Replace Junk Foods
To be successful in transforming a picky eater, fast food and junk food must replace whole food. If stopping for chicken nuggets and French fries is no longer part of your routine, then your picky eater will no longer eat them. Your food budget will benefit by eating at home and your family will be healthier for it.

Read labels and clean out junk foods from your kitchen cupboards! You’ll be fighting an uphill battle if cookies, crackers, chips, and sugar-filled drinks are found in your pantry. Replace processed snack items with nuts, fruit, and veggies slices.

3. Engage the Senses
Kids discover that veggies are yummy when you engage all their senses with multi-sensory learning during mealtimes. Have your vegetable-resistant child explore all the attributes of the refused veggie. A common misconception is that a veggie is rejected because of its taste. But according to current research, dislike of various foods most often results from the texture, smell, or even the color of what is to be eaten. Discuss the attributes of various foods with your child. Pick up and feel its texture. What color is it? What does it smell like? How does it feel in your mouth? Make it fun and your child will soon be a healthy eater.

4. Camouflage Veggies
Okay, this is NOT my favorite strategy, but disguising veggies is helpful in the short-run for the vegetable-challenged child. Getting kids to love whole foods is your long-term goal. Sneaking healthful ingredients into food has been around since moms first made pureed vegetable soup. Stealth health is especially valuable in the initial stages of transforming your picky eater. Making stews and casseroles often changes the texture and melds the flavor of vegetables with other ingredients. Smoothies (both fruit and veggie) are another easy tactic to add more whole foods in a picky eater’s diet. The texture of smoothies easily disguises veggies, so much so they can be impossible to detect. High performance blenders make fresh veggie drinks far superior nutritionally to the high salt content of canned vegetable drinks. V8 Juice® is often recommended as a healthy veggie drink for kids. One serving (5½ ounces) of V8 Juice® contains one-third of a 3 year-old’s and one-fourth of a 4 to 8 year-old’s sodium requirement for an entire day! It’s not the best nutritional choice.

5. Don’t Give Up
Kids are experts at parent manipulation and parents often give up way too soon. Don’t expect your child will love a new food the first time it’s offered. It can take a dozen times or more of offering a new food, before acceptance. Speed up the process by having them taste and experience a veggie at each meal. When you involve your picky eater in food preparation it pays off. Kids have a vested interest in something they helped to cook. And they get the added benefit of experiencing healthy foods with all their senses, before it ever appears on their plate.

Do your best to hide your astonishment the first time your picky eater tastes a previously refused food and likes it. This is what you’ve been working toward, so expect it! After all “Green food is yummy!”

For info about the FREE Baby Bites Ezine, Click Here.

Listen to today’s podcast, Click Here.

For a synopsis of Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater, Click Here.
 

You can change dinner conflict with your picky eater to fun, multi-sensory, memory-making mealtimes. Play is the way children learn and directed-play allows you to incorporate foods your picky eater has previously refused to eat. Once your child’s imagination is engaged, food, especially veggies, takes on a new perspective.

Try Rannosuarus^TM is a green T-Rex. He’s named “Try,” because he’ll try any food and he especially loves veggies. He has an enormous appetite and eats everything in his path.

Ridge can’t wait. His mom just told him that he has a lunch date at Try Rannosaurus’ Edible Swamp!

Try Rannosaurus’ Edible Swamp
Try’s^TM Edible Prehistoric Swamp is an interactive meal. It makes a great lunch or snack when dinner is going to be later than usual. If you have a toddler picky eater, you’ll want to assemble the ingredients yourself. If your picky eater is a bit older, then have him/her assist in the prep work. The description and set-up of the swamp set the stage for learning.

WooHoo! Playing with Try^TM in his food-swamp is lots of fun. Kids don’t know it’s a learning experience as well. Picky eaters, who are usually put off by the textures of vegetables, will be engrossed with the story and the multi-sensory aspect of the swamp. Make sure your child’s hands are thoroughly washed before you begin.

Prepare a guacamole dip and hummus. Wash and cut veggie strips into three-inch julienne pieces. 

In addition, you’ll need:
One small plastic green T-Rex (for Try Rannosuarus^TM) wash Try^TM  in the sink before you begin
Several whole black olives for volcanic rock
Whole button mushrooms for vegetation placed on one edge of the swamp
Celery, carrot, and cucumbers in julienne slices for fallen trees, logs, etc.
Small zucchini cut into discs are lily pads or a path
Broccoli and cauliflower pulled or cut into small pieces; they are prehistoric bushes

Have your child help with the set-up of the swamp. Choose a flat medium-sized dish. Plop a big dollop of guacamole in the center of the plate and flatten it out. That’s the floor of the swamp. Spread hummus around the swamp, it’s the earth and will serve as “glue” to hold the veggie bushes. Place the black olives as rocks on top of a dollop of hummus. Do the same with button mushrooms in another spot. Let your child’s creativity take over. A larger mound of hummus can become a volcano. Dribble a spoonful of salsa on top and down the sides for lava. You get the idea and I’m sure you’ll come up with more on your own! Don’t give in to the temptation to add chips or other processed snack foods. This activity is about learning to appreciate whole foods. (Picky eaters willingly eat chips and other junk foods!)

While you’re setting the stage for Try’s^TM Swamp, discuss the various veggies. Talk about their colors, textures, scents, and tastes. Who likes to eat these? Of course, Try^TM does! In fact, he’s always on the hunt for something yummy to eat, especially green veggies! Try^TM says wonderful things as he’s chomping away at the vegetation. He often bellows, “I’m so hungry, I could eat a tree” and “Green food is yummy”!

Encourage your picky eater to take bites of everything, just like Try^TM. If fussy child refuses to eat something or has difficulty touching gooey food, such as guacamole dip or hummus, you may take this activity one step further. Think of it as food therapy! You washed Try in the sink before you began, right? Give the toy to your fussy child and instruct him/her to march Try^TM through the swamp. Of course Try^TM will devour everything in his path. Be sure Try^TMgets another bath after he romps through  the Edible Swamp.

For info about the free Baby Bites Ezine, Click Here.

For a synopsis of Baby Bites: Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater, Click Here.