March Discussion Question 3
Question 3: As health professionals, what are some ideas we can use to promote the benefits of fruits and vegetables for adolescents or ideas to get them to consume more than half of the recommended amount?
posted by Julie @ 7:45 AM
27 comments
27 Comments:
As a health professional, I think that it is important for us to promote fruit and vegetable consumption. There are a variety of ways one can promote fruits and vegetables for adolescents. To start parents may want to find foods that their kids already like to eat such as: muffins, smoothies, and yogurt, and add different fruits and vegetable to them. For example: adding banana, zucchini or pumpkin to different recipes. Also, take the kids shopping and let me pick out fruits and vegetables that they want to try. Create different fruit smoothies, serve a fruit salad for a dessert or snack, or create a trail mix with dried fruit. To get kids to eat more vegetables, add more vegetables in pasta sauces, lasagna, casseroles, soups, chili, omelets, and pizza toppings. I think more importantly, have the children help with the cooking and picking out different recipes and meals each week. The kids will feel more involved and more inclined to eat what they made.
There are many great ways to introduce more fruits and vegetables into a child's diet. As I mentioned in my post to the 1st question, you just need to be creative.
Some fun ways of incorporating fruits and vegetables into the diet include making smoothies, mixing fruit with yogurt/having a fun dip for veggies, including them in the baking process (into cakes/muffins), and even just finding unusual fruits and vegetables that will spark their curiosity. Examples would be horned melon, passion fruit, daikon, papaya, mango, black eye peas, etc. All of these aren't "common" fruits and vegetables and might get the children interested in trying them just because they look different.
Making it fun and interesting is an easy way to get kids to want to consume more without bogging them down how good it is for them.
There are many ways in which we, as health professionals, can promote fruit and vegetable consumption among adolescents. I think that one of the easiest ways, and most effective ways, in getting children to consume more fruits and vegetables is through food preparation involvement and hands-on-activities. Of course, parents would most likely need to be involved in some of these activities; however, adolescents should be able to complete most of the required tasks on their own. By simply adding a handful of berries to cereal in the morning or slices of tomato to a sandwich at lunch, children could significantly increase their overall fruit and vegetable consumption. Since most adolescents enjoy pizza, extra toppings such as broccoli, green peppers or onions could be added as well as extra tomato sauce. At this age, many children want freedom and want to make their own decisions so by having a weekly “stir-fry” night or a “salad bar” night they can be creative with their food and indulge in a variety of different fruits and vegetables. Parents should be open about letting their children cook with them due to the fact that meal preparation is an excellent time to promote healthful eating and food education.
Rachel - You're right, there are so many ways you can promote more fruits and vegetables to children. I like what you said about adding different/unusual/exotic fruits and vegetables for the children to try. I think that will be a good way to spark the kids interest and get them to try new things. You're right, you do have to make it fun!
As a health professional, the thing that I believe would have the biggest impact and that I would stress to parents is to have as many meals as possible...at home. Admittedly, this is hard especially when you're talking about teens here as their schedules become ridiculous in high school, but I really believe that the highest quality meals are the ones you plan for and create at home. Involving teens in the planning is important, too. Asking them, "How can we fit some salad and veg in this meal...?" gets them involved and discussing options with you. Trying to eat often at home also means that your home kitchen needs to stay pretty well stocked with a variety of fruits and veggies.
Aside from eating at home, I would try to work with local school districts to ensure that high school students have appealing fruit and veg options each day and that junk food machines are limited or even removed. (I'd love to see the french fry option removed completely from schools but I don't know how to accomplish this realistically; when I did prof. practice at Unit 5-which has a really good food offering - it was clear that students really, really expect those fries! Maybe one way to manage kids' choice of FFs is to make all FF orders cost extra and have the healthier F/V options be included as part of the standard meal cost...?)
Well I read this article a bit ago on how to incorporate a gardening program into schools and the community, and I think it sounds fabulous! That is one way to get awareness out there, as long as the funds are available. The sooner the education starts the sooner the kids will begin to recognize the benefits of eating healthy. Even if there were little bits of nutrition education offered just one day a week would be a great start. I am always surprised what and how much their little brains can retain. If there were a way to let the kids sample new foods even better. Foods they typically don't have at home made available at schools or at community events are the best. Making food fun is what it is all about, if you can do that then you will hold their attention and get them to try new stuff.
Susan
I think that it is extremely important that we start young. I also belive that it is imparitive to educate the parents and make it a family affair. As a health professional I believe that promoting any kind of health related benefit should be informative and fun. When children are involved they do not necessarily care about all the boring details, but they do care about the big picture. Children love to do activites and work with their hands. Creating activities or cooking classes for them while promoting fruits and vegetables would be something I would employ. Introducing new fruits and vegetables by taking a trip around the world and connecting culture to food is another educational tool I would use. For adults and children together I would give tips on how to take everyday favorties and sneak in fruits and vegetables. For example: adding diced vegetables to meatloaf, or fruit puree to cakes.
Alison - awesome idea with working with the school district to get healthier vending machine options.
Anna - really like the idea of the dinners with options. If I had the option to add more or less vegetables to my dinner when I was younger I probably would have. I think when children are given more options and have the opportunity to make decisions they are more likely to be creative and experiment.
It is important as health professionals to find way to educate the parents on how to get their children to more fruits and veggies. It is also important to teach both the parents and children on the benefits of adding these in their diets. One idea would be for the parents to add veggies to foods without the child even knowing. Blending different veggies and adding them into a casserole is easy and they would more than likely never know the difference. The same goes for fruit. Adding sliced fruit to yogurt, cereal, and ice cream is easy and tasty. Another idea would be to take the child grocery shopping with you and let them pick out the fruits and vegetables. If it is their idea they are more likely to try it.
It is so important to keep the youth informed on what they are eating (or not eating). Fun activities in the classroom that involve fruits and vegetables, such as taste testing of new fruits and vegetables along with education on the benefits of those foods, would help promote the consumption of these foods. In addition, introducing them to new recipes or food combinations during lunch at school may help promote an increase in fruit and vegetable consumption.
Anna- I liked your idea to have a stir-fry night or salad bar night to give the teens a chance to choose what they want and have some freedom. Little things like that really can make a difference!
Sam,
I think all of your suggestions are great. Putting more vegetables in things to disguise them, getting kids involved in the cooking, and letting them pick out their own fruits and vegetables at the grocery store are all ideas that are sure to increase kids fruit and vegetable consumption.
I think getting people to change their eating habits is a really hard thing, even when they know the benefit. I think one way to possibly get teens to increase their intake of fruits and vegetables would be to tie the benefits to physical appearance (ex. improving the look of the skin, maybe even helping with acne) or athletic performance.
Teens are more likely to do something they can see quick or immediate benefit from. Telling them to eat more fruits and vegetables so they're less likely to have heart disease in 30 years is probably not a strong motivator for them right now.
In order to encourage adolescents to eat more fruits and vegetables, I would try to offer ideas for healthier snacks that are still easily accessable, like apples with a small amount of caramel to dip them in. Or give them the opportunity to chose a food they would like to try, and allow them to help prepare it.
I would recommend to parents to keep fruits and vegetables available at home for kids to grab as an easy snack. I always find it easier to eat fruits/vegetables when I prepare them ahead of time and portion them into baggies or plastic containers so they are easy to grab as I head out the door. It does take a little planning ahead. However, if you purchase these foods and go right home and wash and pre-package them, the job is done and they are ready to grab-and-go!
There are so many ways to go about promoting the benefits of fruits and vegetables and increasing consumption of these foods. Much like we did for NNM, going into schools and providing fun activities and samples is a great way to do so. There are so many creative ways to add F & V to the diet, such as sneaking them into foods that parents already prepare for the family. Adding pumpkin to oatmeal, or having an all-veggie pizza topping night would be just a couple of examples. Berries are great in smoothies or on top of cereal, and bananas can be added to breads or pancakes, the list goes on and on. We need to get the word out there about the amazing benefits of these flavonoid-rich foods!
Colin-
Good suggestion to bring your child to the grocery store with you! I think it's important for the kids to get into the produce section to see what is available. It's always amazing to me how much children like new foods if they just try them!
Sam,
I like your idea about adding fruits and veggies to smoothies. Those are usually well liked and it is easy to hide fruit in them. I also liked your idea about haveing the child pick out recipes that he/she likes. They are more likely to eat the food if they picked it out.
One of the main ways to get kids to consume more fruits and vegetables is to get their parents to cook/prepare them and have them around the home. If they aren't available we can't expect them to consume them. Also parents need to be the role model and eat more fruits and vegetables. Studies show that kids learn eating habits from their parents early in life. Once we get the fruits and vegetables in the home we need to make them more appealing than the bad name of "have to eat your vegetables." We need to let kids know why they should eat them and what they do for the body. Nutrition should be more stressed in the classroom and at home. The more kids know about the connection between health and foods the more likely they will to be to consume them.
Sam,
I love your idea of adding fruits and vegetables to common foods like muffins and breads. This would help to get kids out of the mind set of having to eat their vegetables and fruits.
Last semester Nicole and I had the opportunity to talk to a group of Second graders about different kinds of fruits. The wide variety of foods available to these kids means that they recognize and/or have tried several of the more 'unusual' fruits Nicole and I brought out. They were more than willing to try them when it was convenient.
That being said, I think the best way we health professionals can encourage consumption is by encouraging purchasing behaviors. Telling parents to buy fresh produce in place of some of their more traditional snack items. I take the Field of Dreams approach. If the good food is there, people will eat it. So make sure the good food is available to encourage consumption.
As far as promoting benefits of F/V is concerned, I would suggest flooding the media. My sister is the most unhealthy eater I know. I get a contact sugar rush just by standing near her. She buys food based on commercials alone. She knows every Snickers radio commercial, she knows 'sports drinks' by the celebrities in their TV ads and she can ID a Doritos billboard at 300 yards. The girl is a media consumer--she's a teenager! So put catchy commercials on Tv and the radio. Plaster billboards with fun images of F/V. The Chicago food bank did an excellent job of that this winter. Their ads were gorgeous and made you want to look at them. You almost didn't realize what they were peddling until it was too late.
That's how we'll get 'em: guerilla advertising.
Awesome customized stirfry idea. I really like it. There's this restaurant in Champaign called Za's. Pizza, salads, and sandwiches that you get to pick the toppings for. Everytime we go my Mom says she wants to put Za's in her fridge. The thing is, it would be so easy to do! Get a stock of F/V and just keep throwing them into everything you eat.
Good idea, Anna.
Here are some ideas that I would give to adolescents to consume more fruits and vegetables. I would tell them to select easy to eat fresh fruits such as apples, bananas, oranges, plums, peaches and grapes, to pick up pre-cut packages of melon, pineapple, or fruits salad. Also, they can buy bags of frozen blueberries, strawberries, peaches, and mangos and put them in a smoothie, or buy single-serve containers of 100% fruit juice. For vegetables, I would recommend picking up pre-washed bags of salad greens and spinach, buy no-chop veggies like baby carrots, cherry tomatoes, broccoli and cauliflower florets, pre-cut celery and sugar snap peas, to supple their freezers with frozen vegetables, and to purchase canned beans. I think that one of the most important things to think about when getting adolescents to eat fruits and vegetables is convenience, and all of these recommendations are convenient as well as nutritious options.
I think the plate method stresses the importance of fitting fruits and vegetables into the diet. Schools are making fruits and vegetables highly accessable to students in the raw/natural state. However, to increase consumption, add fruits and vegetables to snacks/meals that you might not normally. For example, dried fruit in trail mix, extra veggies on a cheese pizza, spinach in marinara sauce, fresh fruit on yogurt. Promoting the benefits of fruits and vegetables is difficult without a proper venue. The fresh fruit and vegetable program at Bent elementary school had kids try a new fruit or veggie day, with a short education on the benefits of that particular fruit/veggie and some fun facts about it. That program had a lot of success, even increasing lunch fruit and veggie consumption by 10-15% in the first 3 weeks. Unfortunately, promotion of the benefits requires resources in many cases, and resources at this time are hard to come by.
First, I think it is important for them to have an idea of how much is enough. Teenagers in general are competitive, so establishing goals, whether in public or private, would encourage greater fruit and vegetable consupmtion. Nutrition goals can be made in a related class, such as phys ed or health, where students have support in their efforts.
Secondly, I continue to stress the importance of peer influence at this age; if you can get the "cool" teenagers eating the right foods, there is a great possiblity that others will follow. Making fruit and vegetable offerings the norm will lead to greater consumption. For example, consistantly providing apples, oranges, carrots, grapes, etc for post-game meals for the teams will lead to players to expect and anticipate the healthy options.
Alison - I fully agree with the idea about trying to make as many meals at home as possible. Its a great way to ensure that you know they are getting something healthy. I really like the idea of asking the kids about how we can incorporate veggies or a salad into the meal. That's a great way to make them think about what they are eating and also getting them involved with the meal will make them more interested (as well as just being some quality time with your kids).
Erin,
I definitely agree with you on the "Field of Dreams" approach. If we put in front of them they will eat it. Very clever by the way :). We really need to target the parents because they are the ones that are paying for the food, and they are the ones that have (or can have, if they are strict and enforce it) the final say when it comes to their children's diets.
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