An age-appropriate diet is one that provides adequate nutrition for growth, development, and learning and can even help prevent childhood obesity. Parents especially mothers can check these suggestions for reference:
Babies
How you feed your newborn is the first nutrition decision you will make for your child. According to the Department of Health (DOH) babies should be breastfed exclusively until they are six months old, as breast milk contains everything that the baby needs at this stage in their development.
For some mothers, though, issues such as mastitis (an infection of the breast tissue) make it difficult to continue breastfeeding; baby formula from a bottle is the next best thing.
At six months old, babies can be slowly introduced to solids with some rice cereal, mashed veggies, fruit, and meat (mixed with breast milk or formula). By 12 months, babies can try most healthy foods your family is eating.
Toddlers
Toddler years are a great time to establish healthy habits for life. When it comes to toddler eating, trust your child’s appetite. As mothers, you decide what food they will eat, your child decides how much.
Cooking good food with your child gives you the chance to introduce a range of fresh, healthy food. Good food means a wide variety of fresh foods from the main food groups-fruit, vegetables, grains, lean meats, fish, poultry, and dairy. It’s also a good idea to limit sweets, chips and biscuits as these can interfere with children’s natural appetite for nutritious food.
Encourage your child to be physically active as well. It is good for a child to have at least two hours of moderate to vigorous physical activity every day to boost his immune system. It also reduces the risk of him becoming overweight.
(Sources: http://raisingchildren.net.au; www.chiltonhealth.org; www.lmhospital.org)
The Freeman with the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc. is running weekly features on Early Childhood Care and Development to emphasize the importance of Early Childhood Care and Development (ECCD) and to increase public support for ECCD. For comments or suggestions, e-mail Hannah.Aranas@rafi.org.ph.