How to Build Food Literacy in Kids
By: Natalie Abdalla, fourth-year student completing a Bachelor of Applied Science in Nutrition and Food from Toronto Metropolitan University, reviewed and edited by registered dietitians at JM Nutrition
How to build food literacy in kids is certainly a concept of critical importance. It’s also one that we feel we must examine as health and nutrition professionals. After all, food is a powerful tool. It has its own language and is often utilized in social connection.
In addition, an important event in a person’s life is usually celebrated through a meal. This applies to all cultures.
What’s more, bonding is frequently experienced between a mentor and mentee in the kitchen, while passing down recipes.
Food is also essential for maintaining good health and well-being–something that is generally common knowledge these days.
However, with the rise of fad diets and misinformation, how can we teach children about the importance of food?
Because children learn through example, their relationship with food is heavily influenced by the actions and attitudes of the individuals around them (Ares et al., 2024). These actions could either encourage or discourage them from having a healthy relationship with food (Ares et al., 2024).
Food literacy in children is an essential, yet overlooked aspect of knowledge that can set a child up for success and health.
For these reasons, we feel compelled to provide a general framework to show how to build food literacy in kids.
Let’s take a look.
But, before we tackle ways to increase food literacy in children, it’s important to define what food literacy is.
What is food literacy?
Food literacy is the ability to obtain and utilize knowledge about food, nutrition, and health to make educated diet choices (Palumbo et al., 2019). In simple and child-friendly terms, food literacy is knowing what healthy food choices look like (Palumbo et al., 2019).
And what is healthy food anyway?
What is healthy food?
First, it’s crucial to define what “healthy” food is because doing so is essential to help build the foundation of food literacy.
Healthy food, or a healthy diet, consists of the nutrients: carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. When eaten in appropriate amounts, these nutrients can support the body’s physiological needs (Cena & Calder, 2020).
Therefore, simple fruits, vegetables, protein, and whole grain sources are consistent with the definition of healthy foods. And, as such, are imperative to a healthy diet.
These nutrients, however, are not the only aspect of a healthy diet. Making a healthy food choice can look like choosing to eat a sandwich rather than a cookie, because you’ve already had multiple cookies before having lunch, and therefore have had a high consumption of sugar that day.
Making a healthy food choice can also look like eating cake at a birthday party because it’s a fun celebration and tastes great.
Food goes beyond the nutrients that are found in it. Part of having a healthy and balanced relationship with food is learning to enjoy the food in front of you. It is knowing that food can be both nutritious and delicious.
A key factor in teaching littles ones about food is to make it interactive (Velardo, 2015).
Here are 6 ways that show how to build food literacy in kids, be it at home or in the classroom:
1. Be the influence
Naturally, parents play an incredibly important role in the way that children approach food. If parents model prioritizing eating a balanced diet and enjoying their food, children are more likely to do the same (Miller et al., 2017).
When you cook breakfast, lunch and dinner, strive to feed the whole family the same meal. Parents, or adults in general, tend to have a more diverse palate, and therefore, eat a diverse range of meals.
By feeding children the same meals that adults eat, they will become exposed to a wide variety of foods. This will help broaden their palates and help make them less picky eaters.
Doing so will also allow them to become more educated and knowledgeable about food and the different ways foods can be prepared and consumed.
2. Garden with children
Another effective way to build food literacy in kids is through gardening. Gardening with children is an excellent way to help build their knowledge about food in a hands-on way. The interactive process educates children on the importance of soil, water and sunlight in the growth of plants.
What’s more, gardening allows children to see how a plant starts as a seedling, grows branches and leaves, and then blooms flowers that eventually produce fruit.
Through understanding and witnessing the process that is taken to produce food, children will understand where their food comes from. It will also show them the different ways in which the plant can be used.
When children have a hand in growing food, they will be more likely and more willing to eat it because it’s a fruit of their labour. They helped water the plant, watched it grow and picked it from the plant.
Take this opportunity to grow new foods or new varieties of foods to teach children more about plants. For example, carrots come in a variety of colours besides the orange ones normally sold at the grocery store. Or, if your child has never tried a radish before, consider planting radishes to introduce them to a new vegetable.
Health is valuable, and food is one of the main factors that contribute to good health. Teaching children that through exercise, an adequate exposure to sunlight, water, and food, they can do anything. Just as plants need water, sunlight, and food to grow, we, too, need these elements to live long and healthy lives.
Related: Why is Drinking Water Important
Undoubtedly, this is one of the more significant ways to help build literacy in kids.
3. The grocery store is your food literacy classroom
The simple act of going to the grocery store is an opportunity to build food literacy in kids.
Encourage your children to come on trips with you to the grocery store. Allow them to identify the different foods they recognize.
You can also clarify or investigate the foods they are curious about.
In addition, ask them to identify the defining features of a food such as the ridges of a walnut or the vibrant purple of an eggplant.
If you’re able to, purchase a couple of new food items and try them together.
In a classroom setting, on the other hand, show children photos of a grocery store and let them explore it that way. Be sure to point out the different types of foods and the nutrients they contain.
Furthermore, consider these points, when building food literacy in children (Cena & Calder, 2020):
- Fruits and vegetables have fibre, which aids in digestion.
- Fibre also helps keep us full after a meal.
- Carbohydrate-rich foods such as rice, grains, potatoes or bread have a sugar called glucose that the brain needs to function efficiently.
- You can get protein from animal (beef, chicken, fish) or plant (tofu, legumes, nuts) sources.
- Protein helps us grow muscles.
- Vitamins and minerals help our bodies fight off infection.
- Our bodies are made up of water, so we must drink water to ensure we stay hydrated.
Last, be sure to point out the foods that are high in sugar or those that are highly processed. Teach them that these foods can be delicious and okay to consume in moderation. But too much of it is not good for them.
Related: How to Save Money at the Grocery Store
4. Cook with your children
This is a great how-to-build-food-literacy strategy.
Undoubtedly, the best way to teach children about how food comes to be is through cooking with them.
When you cook with children, they learn important skills such as cutting, chopping and stirring, which will aid them in their ability to make their own food when they are hungry.
These kitchen skills will also allow them to practice and improve their fine motor, math and time management skills. Doing so will teach them how to be self-sufficient as well (Miller et al., 2017).
The ability to feed oneself is an incredibly important skill that all individuals must develop. By teaching children how to cook from an early age, they will develop the skills necessary to be able to keep themselves well fed and healthy. This is food literacy personified.
Additionally, cooking with children teaches them the importance of a home-cooked meal. It can teach them that home cooking is often much healthier than foods they eat out, and will provide them with the option of choice. They will have the knowledge and ability to cook for themselves and take charge of their health. This effectively reduces the likelihood of them having to choose to eat ready-prepared meals due to their inability to cook (Miller et al., 2017).
Related: Meal Prepping Tips
5. Give the kids autonomy
If you’re stumped and not sure how to build food literacy in kids, try the time-tested method of giving children autonomy.
When you include children in the purchasing of food for the week or together picking the meals that will be consumed, you will make a child more willing and open to eating. They will effectively feel a sense of connection or ownership with the food. When this occurs, they child will likely look forward to eating the meals (Di Pasquale & Rivolta, 2018).
In addition, the child will feel a sense of contribution to the whole process, which will make them more likely to eat the meals prepared (Di Pasquale & Rivolta, 2018).
As children begin to explore new foods by building their food literacy, they may be picky with what they eat. They may begin to dislike foods they once used to enjoy, or enjoy foods they once used to dislike. While this may be frustrating, allowing children to embrace their autonomy with food will allow them to develop a healthy relationship with it.
Related: Picky Eating Tips
And, in the end, they will be more open than they once were.
Understanding the body’s cues of hunger, thirst and fullness is incredibly important in developing a healthy relationship with food. It can prevent overeating, under-eating, or the misinterpretation of certain cues as hunger.
When children express that they feel full, encourage them to stop eating despite the fact that their plates aren’t empty, and to resume when they feel hungry again.
Related: Eating Intuitively
Additionally, emotions such as sadness or boredom can fuel the need to eat as a source of comfort (Monroe, 2015). When you teach children to be mindful of their cues, you will help eliminate the unwanted consequences of using food as a source of comfort (Monroe, 2015).
Related: How to Stop Emotional Eating
Being mindful of the pace at which we eat is also an important lesson to teach children to prevent them from eating beyond the point of fullness. To eat slowly and enjoy the food in front of them is an excellent point to bring up (Monroe, 2015).
6. Embrace the process of teaching food literacy to kids
When building food literacy in kids, it’s important to keep this raised point in mind.
Essentially, learn to embrace the mess that will come with learning.
Utilize the vibrant colours and pigments of food.
Consider relating foods to body parts to help children remember them better. For example, cut-up carrots look like eyes, and walnuts look like the brain.
Be willing to get dirty with soil and dirt, when gardening.
Be open to letting your kitchen get dirty as part of the fun, and then clean the fun up together. This is especially important to keep in mind because children cooking for the first couple of times will result in a messy kitchen. Pure and simple.
Regardless, be patient and the benefits will begin to pour in.
Teach kids that food is magic and does magical things to our bodies. It heals us, keeps us full, makes us strong, helps us think and concentrate, and makes our taste buds very happy (Cena & Calder, 2020).
Conclusion
We hope that this list of how to build food literacy in kids tips shed some bright light on this ever-important aspect of raising our children. We hope that these strategies prove helpful in your journey to increased food literacy in your children. If you feel we missed an important point or two, by all means, get in touch with us and let us know.
If you’re interested in working with a dietitian who specializes in pediatric care or a family nutritionist, book a free consultation and we will certainly provide assistance.
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JM Nutrition is a nutritional counselling service by registered dietitians and nutritionists. Main office: JM Nutrition Toronto.
