PARTE DECLARATIVA ALCALDÍA

To target the energy-in side of the equation, you can start paying closer attention to where your child’s calories are coming from and how appropriate the total amount is. Some kids, especially those who are active, can seem to inhale food and stay thin and healthy. But other kids are either sedentary or have a tendency to gain weight even if they do stay fairly active. For the latter group, it’s often necessary to make some restrictions in their diet.

The following chapters will explore what’s in foods and what are the most healthful food choices for kids. One of the best ways to both improve health and limit excess calories is to choose foods that actually do something for the body rather than just provide calories. Foods like fruits and vegetables contain needed vitamins and minerals, but they are also full of water and fiber and are relatively

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low in calories. In contrast, sugary sodas and juice drinks, candy, and chips are basi-cally just cheap and easy calories, with little else the body needs—that’s why these foods truly are “empty calories.” By limiting the amount of these ingredients their children eat, parents can help limit extra calories and make the most out of the foods kids do eat.

Of course, while good food choices can help, our energy equation shows us that how much you eat is the bottom line. One of the biggest concerns is portion size, or how much of a food we typically eat at one sitting. Few of us are immune to the lures of a heaping portion of a food we enjoy. Several studies have found that por-tion size is directly related to intake; in other words, when more food is offered, people tend to eat more, whether they are lean or overweight. A recent study from Penn State tested whether feeding children an extra-large portion of a certain dish would affect how much they ate. Children were first served lunches consisting of portions appropriate to their ages, but at a later occasion were given a meal with one of the entrees in the lunch, macaroni and cheese, at double the recommended portion size. The study found that children responded to the large portion by eat-ing larger bites of the pasta—they ate an average of 25 percent more of the pasta and 15 percent more calories in the total meal. So putting more food on the plate can really change how much your child eats. It’s always a better option to serve smaller portions and go get seconds if needed.

Some evidence also suggests that eating more than our fill is a skill we acquire, for better or worse. In another study from Penn State, children aged three and a half were offered lunches at different portion sizes and ate about the same number of calories regardless of how much was given to them. In contrast, children aged five ate a greater amount of calories when served a larger portion. This would sug-gest that infants and toddlers have an innate ability to regulate caloric intake that is gradually lost as kids get older.

Parents are largely responsible for providing their children cues about how to eat, especially when kids are very young. While most parents aren’t worried about their kids eating too much when they are only five or six years old, this is actually a perfect time to start developing a sense of appropriate portion size, rather than waiting until kids reach adolescence and their habits are more fixed. Here are a few ways parents can start addressing the intake end of the energy equation:

• From those first feedings of solid foods during infancy, make eating a task that is given your child’s full attention. Set aside a space in the high chair or at the

dinner table with no distractions like TV. In the mornings before school, make sure your child sits down to breakfast instead of eating food on the go.

• Encourage children to stop eating when they feel satisfied or nearly full. This is a hard habit for parents to learn, since many adults grew up with their parents scolding them for not cleaning their plate. Nowadays those tactics are no longer helpful for most kids. Parents should instead discourage eating beyond the point of fullness, from infancy on.

• Keep an eye on your child’s portion sizes to make sure servings aren’t too big.

Instead of eating from heaping plates at meals, your family can start with small portions and go for seconds if someone is still hungry after waiting a few minutes.

At restaurants, you can order from a children’s menu if it offers healthy options.

But beware: many children’s menus offer cheap foods that are easy for kids to accept, and are loaded with hot dogs, french fries, and other less healthy foods. It might be better to order a small appetizer or meal from the adult menu, and encour-age your child to leave some on the plate or take part of it home for later. Getting in the doggie-bag habit is one of the best things you can do for your whole family to combat big restaurant portions.

• Make sure as many calories as possible are useful ones. The majority of a child’s calories should come from vegetables, fruits, nutritious grains and protein sources, and some healthful fats. Foods that contain added sugar, or are dense with calories from too much fat, should not take the place of more nutritious sources of calories.

• Limit calories from drinks. Sweetened beverages and juices are a primary source of excess calories in many children’s diet (see Chapter 10), because people often drink sugar-laden beverages as if they were water, not food. A better idea is to just drink water throughout the day, and low-fat or skim milk with meals. If your child wants something with more flavor than water, try artificially sweetened waters, sodas, or powdered drink mixes.

• Remember that eating is influenced by social and emotional forces, and par-ents have a big influence on how their children feel about food. By overly restrict-ing certain foods or usrestrict-ing them as bribes, you could be sendrestrict-ing the message that food is a reward, and may encourage an unhealthy attitude toward eating.

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• Don’t be afraid to set limits when your child’s health is at stake. By giving in to supermarket tantrums, you play right into the hands of advertisers. Instead, treat junk food as you would any item that is off-limits to children, and avoid taking a tired, hungry child to the store.

Putting It into Practice: A Simple Weight Control Plan for Your Family

These simple first steps can go a long way toward helping your family lose weight or stay at a healthy weight:

• Cut back on sugary beverages.

• Eat your breakfast. As I mentioned in the last chapter, people who eat breakfast gener-ally weigh less and eat fewer calories throughout the day.

• Never eat in front of the TV, and limit TV or video time to a maximum of two hours per day.

• Eat meals together as a family as often as you can.

• Plan simple meals that emphasize fresh foods over processed ones. Try some of the recipe ideas in this book, and save time by chopping vegetables or setting aside ingredi-ents ahead of time so they are ready to cook when you need them.

• Include fiber-rich foods at every meal, like fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes.

They will keep you fuller longer.

• Make your life a little more inconvenient. Take stairs regularly instead of escalators.

Walk or ride your bike to a nearby destination instead of driving. Studies have shown that lifestyle changes such as these can be more effective for weight loss than sched-uled exercise, and they are easier to maintain in the long term.

• To step up your activity level, schedule time for a simple daily activity, like walking the dog or riding bikes in the neighborhood. If your neighborhood is not safe for outdoor play, help your child find an indoor activity she can do every day, even for ten or fifteen minutes. It can be as simple as dancing in her bedroom to a favorite CD. Or you can purchase a bicycle stand to turn her bike into an inexpensive home gym—she can even peddle during her TV time.