Okay, this is going to sound strange, but I did a little research on trying to get kids to eat healthy, seeing as how I never ate healthy at all growing up. It was pretty rare that I actually consumed something that was actually good for me like a piece of fruit for a snack or vegetables at dinner. Yeah, pretty sad right? Actually, there was only ONE food I loved as a kid — SPINACH. I didn’t care what form it was in, whether raw or from a can, I couldn’t get enough of it! I remember once in 4th grade my mom actually came into school just to give me my spinach that I forgot to bring with me that day!

So I was thinking about ways to get kids to eat healthy. I started doing a little digging and found some research from the Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs (or “BEN”…thankfully they had something to shorten that name down, sheesh!)

You’ll be “bowled over”!

Anyway, the BEN Center has done a lot of interesting research on how to get kids to eat healthy. Remember how I said I didn’t want to eat fruit as a kid? They suggest that you present the fruit to a child in a vibrantly colored bowl. Think about it — it makes sense! They’re bombarded with these crazy colors on television constantly from cartoons and kids’ shows, so putting fruit on a plain old plate and saying “here, kid, eat this” is really not going to make it happen. So if you have some bright, non-faded tupperware around the house, put the healthy food in a multi-colored bowl of some sort and see how your kid reacts. It’s a cheap, effective way to get kids to eat healthy.

It’s a Matter of Character(s)

Here’s another odd one — we know that these sugar-coated cereals are no good for the kids, but why do they eat them? It isn’t just because they are coated with sugar. It’s because they love the character associated with the cereal! Now, I work with kids doing children’s parties, and when I come out dressed as Elmo, Spiderman, Buzz Lightyear or something else like that, the kids go BONKERS! Crazy enough, the University of Pennsylvania says these characters on the boxes actually are associated with how the child perceives how the cereal TASTES. Basically the research concluded that putting a media character on the box actually made it possible to override a small child’s assessment of nutritional merit. Weird, right? Now I am not saying that you should invite me over dressed as Shrek every time your child sits down for breakfast — although I guess I could never say that I had a dull day if that happened all the time. But I am saying that if you want to get kids to eat healthy, associate healthy food with a character. Remember how I said I loved spinach? I have a feeling it’s because I watched Popeye constantly in my formative years. And I was bullied a lot because I was a small little shrimp, so I made the assessment that if Popeye ate spinach, I should too. So, to get the kids to eat smart, associate healthy food with a fun character and you will have kids eating the good stuff!