Kids and Nutrition
My latest fave TV show is Jamie's School Dinners.
Take a famous British chef, have him get disgusted about the junk that is being fed to kids in school cafeterias and then see him try to reform the system.
Very interesting. For me on both a personal and professional level.
Personal - I have kids who can be fussy eaters. I constantly stress about them eating the right things. I wonder about how to get them interested in good food.
Professional - I produce materials on the importance of nutrition for kids. I work in a place that tries to systematically change children's outcomes.
Today was the most disgusting tidbit of information. Stop reading right now if you have a queasy stomach. Because some kids eat virtually all processed food and no fruit or veg, they can get extremely constipated. Last week a nutritionist said that some kids don't have a BM for 6 weeks! This week another said that in extreme cases, because the intestines are so compacted with food, the kids will sometimes start vomiting food that has been digested to the point that it could be considered feces.
How did things get this bad?
His most successful interventions involved getting the kids involved in making the food. They were more willing to try what they had a part in producing. I think that's something we could stand to do more. I prefer to work alone in the kitchen. But the kids do like to help. And I have noticed they seem a bit more willing to try things.
This kind of thing reminds me that we can't just throw up our hands and say it's up to the parents. Some parents just won't do what is healthy for their children. The best choice is often the most difficult choice, and when families are stressed to the max sometimes what is healthy doesn't seem feasible. At a societal level, it is important to make healthy choices easy choices.
The first high school in which he changed the menu to healthy food went bad - at first. Kids complained, stopped coming, dumped the food in the trash. But in about a month, things were back to normal, except that the kids were actually eating healthy food instead of processed junk every lunch. That speaks to the power of perseverence.
Take a famous British chef, have him get disgusted about the junk that is being fed to kids in school cafeterias and then see him try to reform the system.
Very interesting. For me on both a personal and professional level.
Personal - I have kids who can be fussy eaters. I constantly stress about them eating the right things. I wonder about how to get them interested in good food.
Professional - I produce materials on the importance of nutrition for kids. I work in a place that tries to systematically change children's outcomes.
Today was the most disgusting tidbit of information. Stop reading right now if you have a queasy stomach. Because some kids eat virtually all processed food and no fruit or veg, they can get extremely constipated. Last week a nutritionist said that some kids don't have a BM for 6 weeks! This week another said that in extreme cases, because the intestines are so compacted with food, the kids will sometimes start vomiting food that has been digested to the point that it could be considered feces.
How did things get this bad?
His most successful interventions involved getting the kids involved in making the food. They were more willing to try what they had a part in producing. I think that's something we could stand to do more. I prefer to work alone in the kitchen. But the kids do like to help. And I have noticed they seem a bit more willing to try things.
This kind of thing reminds me that we can't just throw up our hands and say it's up to the parents. Some parents just won't do what is healthy for their children. The best choice is often the most difficult choice, and when families are stressed to the max sometimes what is healthy doesn't seem feasible. At a societal level, it is important to make healthy choices easy choices.
The first high school in which he changed the menu to healthy food went bad - at first. Kids complained, stopped coming, dumped the food in the trash. But in about a month, things were back to normal, except that the kids were actually eating healthy food instead of processed junk every lunch. That speaks to the power of perseverence.
posted by Jude | 12:03 AM
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