Nutrition

Parents – Encourage Your Children to Eat Healthy!

A healthy meal should have foods from the 5 food groups:
Milk, Meat, Vegetable, Fruit, and Grains.

• Eat a variety of foods.
• Choose a diet with plenty of grain products, vegetables and fruits.
• Choose a diet low in fat, sugars, and salt.
• Balance the foods you eat with physical exercise.

Blast Off with Breakfast! Kids who eat breakfast….

• have an easier time learning
• behave better in school
• are more likely to be in school.

Breakfast doesn’t have to be boring – feast on peanut butter and bananas on toast or make a fruit smoothie – just use your imagination!

To know the facts…

Most packaged foods have a nutrition facts label. For a healthier you, use this tool to make smart food choices quickly and easily. Try these tips:

• Keep these low: saturated fats, trans fats, cholesterol, and sodium.
• Get enough of these: potassium, fiber, vitamins A and C, calcium, and iron.
• Use the % Daily Value (DV) column when possible: 5% DV or less is low, 20% DV or more is high.
• Check servings and calories. Look at the serving size and how many servings you are actually consuming. If you double the servings you eat, you double the calories and nutrients.
• Make your calories count. Look at the calories on the label and compare them with what nutrients you are also getting to decide whether the food is worth eating. When one serving of a single food item has over 400 calories per serving, it is high in calories.
• Don’t sugarcoat it. Since sugars contribute calories with few, if any, nutrients, look for foods and beverages low in added sugars. Read the ingredient list and make sure that added sugars are not one of the first few ingredients. Some names for added sugars (caloric sweeteners) include sucrose, glucose, high fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, maple syrup, and fructose.
• Know your fats. Look for foods low in saturated fats, trans fats, and cholesterol to help reduce the risk of heart disease. Most of the fats you eat should be polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats. Keep total fat intake between 20% to 35% of calories.

Reduce sodium (salt), increase potassium. Research shows that eating less than 2,300 milligrams of sodium (about 1 tsp of salt) per day may reduce the risk of high blood pressure. Most of the sodium people eat comes from processed foods, not from the saltshaker. Also look for foods high in potassium, which counteracts some of sodium’s effects on blood pressure.