March is National Nutrition Month, and here at FoodPlay, we’re pleased to take this opportunity to launch a new, recurring feature, Hands-On Nutrition with Barbara Storper, MS, RD. Throughout the month, I’ll be sharing strategies for turning kids on to healthy eating and active living, offered up in quick & easy, bite-sized morsels!
Strategy #1: SHOW! Don’t TELL!
We consider soda to be the #1 nutrition enemy for kids. The average child drinks over 600 cans of soda a year, and the average teen drinks even more. Aside from the 160 empty calories from sugar, many sodas contain caffeine, a central nervous system stimulant that affects children, can for can, twice as much as adults. Drinking too much soda may also affect the body’s calcium balance and contribute to the rising rates of osteoporosis among today’s youth.
How do you get kids to kick the soda habit? Start With the Shocking Truth:
Have kids try to…
- Guess how much sugar is in one can of soda (12 ounces)? TEN TEASPOONS of sugar!
- Guess how much sugar is in one Supersized cola (42 ounces)? 35 TEASPOONS OF sugar! That’s almost a whole cup of sugar!
Then, SHOW! Don’t TELL!
- Pour out the teaspoons into a cup, and have kids count along to show how much there actually is in one can or one Supersized cola. Use salt instead of sugar—it’s less sticky and keeps the ants away!
- Convert your soda drinkers with the “soak-in-the-coke” experiment: Place an old tooth, chicken bone, or iron nail in cola overnight and have kids check out the damage 24 hours later!
- Make up your own “soda naturale”: half seltzer, half fruit juice. Delicious!
- Have your kids start a “Can the Soda!” campaign, filling your class piggy bank to save the money they spend on soda for something better.
- Check out the soda poster from our online store. It’s a fun way to start a lesson on soda, and can be posted next to a vending machine at school or in the office.
Check back tomorrow for more Hands-On Nutrition with Barbara Storper, MS, RD!
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