01/18/2024
Wiefit Tip of the day!: What are some good rules of thumb when feeding your children?
I help many clients not only with their personal customized meal plans, but also for their children. When feeding your children, it’s important to know what a plate of food should look like.
First, use a plate a couple inches smaller in diameter than your plate. Filling your plate with food is way too much food for a pre-puberty child.
On that plate, 1/2 of that plate should be fruits and veggies—yes, 1/2 of the plate.
1/4th should be a protein serving—about the size of the palm of their hand. So as they grow and that hand gets bigger, so should their protein serving.
The other 1/4th should be a starchy whole grain carb such as potato, brown rice, quinoa (this is actually a seed), whole grain pasta, oatmeal, etc. Now I know I said 1/4th of the plate should be a starchy whole grain carb. This is the x-factor. If your child is not active at all, and is also overweight, you can cut that down in half, or even skip it every other meal. Now if that child is super skinny and/or is very active, you can double that serving. If they are into an endurance sport such as soccer, basketball, or cross country, and the sport is in-season, you should double that starchy whole grain carb serving. Think of starchy whole grain carbs as gasoline forr a car. If you drive a lot, you need more gasoline. If you hardly drive, you need less.
As for fat, prepuberty serving should be about 1/2 tablespoon. During and after puberty, think more of a full tablespoon. This could be the healthy oil you use to sautee veggies, cook your meat with, or almond butter, natural peanut butter, etc.
I hope this helps. Keep it simple with the kids. If your kid is really overweight and fights you, bring them in and we can dive a lot deeper with this. I’m not great at many things, but have had tremendous success with helping kids, even as young as 7, lose a lot of fat and get on the right track. It’s never too early to teach someone a healthy diet.
