Nutritional Requirements for Children

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Nutritional Requirements for Children

  1. It is undeniable the importance of an adequate nutrition to ensure growth and development, especially during childhood and its role in promoting and maintaining health and well-being of the individual.

The Child Care Setting while feeding children should devote attention to encourage the consumption of various foods offered on the menu, guiding them to eat in moderation, how to do and not do, repressing when pouring or spreading food.

Never punish, embarrass or force children when refuse to eat, never used children even as a baby receiving food as a reward or distraction.

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The act of eating alone is a feeling new to the child and should be performed with pleasure; teach them that they need to eat not to fast or too slow.

Encourage children to eat new foods: like fruits and vegetables, the introduction of other foods than breast milk or formula should be done after 6 months.

Juices, water, fruits, vegetables, cereals, meats, eggs, derivatives of milk introduced progressively lead to a healthy diet.

The Child Care Setting can help parents with children’s food consumption, vitamins and minerals their bodies need, with an incredible range of colour combinations and flavours providing rich, healthy and tasty food.

We can use fairy tales in Child Care Settings as a way to teach healthy food habits, such as Hansel and Gretel explaining that we cannot eat so many sweets or chocolates; Little Red Riding Wood who was taking a basket full of healthy food to her grandmother; Ratatouille who dreamed being a head master and follow the footsteps of the chef who he idolized, etc.

Baby/ Toddler age Kcal per day:

Boy/ Girl

Portions per day
6 months 760kcal/ 710 kcal* Carbohydrates-3

Vegetables-3

Fruits-3

Breast milk/ formula

Meat/eggs-2

Beans-1

Oil/ Fat-2

Sugar- 0

9 months 880kcal/820kcal*
1 year 960 kcal/910 kcal*
2 years 1190kcal/ 1130kcal* Carbohydrates-5

Vegetables-3

Fruits-4

Milk/ dairy-4

Meat/eggs-2

Beans-1

Oil/ Fat-2

Sugar-1

3 years 1280kcal/1230kcal*
4 years 1490kcal/1370kcal* Carbohydrates-5

Vegetables-3

Fruits-3

Milk/Dairy-3

Meat/eggs-2

Beans-1

Oil/ Fat-1

Sugar-1

5 years 1600kcal/1460kcal*

*estimated

  1. There are many types of food that are unsuitable for babies and toddlers and we as carers and parents need to have extra care, for example: we should avoid cooking with salt because it is associated to hypertension and their kidneys have difficulty in eliminate the excess.

When cooking for babies and toddlers with salt we should be in attention the guideline salt intake, where babies from birth to age of 6months should be less than 1 g/d because breast milk or formula already has enough salt for their bodies. Babies from 7months to 1 year 1g/d; 1 to 3 years 2 g/d; 4 to 6 years3g/d (…)

Always have extra care when cooking with salt for babies or toddlers.

It is recommended that children up to 1 year do not consume honey; it can be contaminated with spores of Clostridium botulinum bacteria responsible for transmitting the intestinal botulism.

In the first year of life, the intestinal flora is still in development and cannot stop the action of these bacteria.

Sugar or refined sugar, are high calories foods, poor in nutrients and in overconsumption can cause a number of diseases.

Excessive sugars intake while increasing the concentration of insulin in the blood also increases the amount of adrenaline causing irritation, anxiety, arousal, and difficulty concentrating.

Sugar is not only present in sweets, but also in frizzy juices and some types of yogurts.

One well known disease of children and adults are tooth decay and gum inflation caused by habitual intake of sweets and frizzy juices.

Nuts are foods at higher risk of causing allergies and should be only introduced to children after age of 5.

The probability of a potentially allergic reaction increases with the presence of allergic parents and with early or late introduction of a new food.

It is also important, the amount and the frequency with which the food will be offered to children.

Eggs are also an allergenic food and it should be given only on babies by the age of 6 months and never before.

When cooking eggs, they must be firstly thoroughly washed and cooked well to reduce the risk of salmonella infection.

The symptoms of salmonella infection may vary of intensity