As a parent, you’re already aware of what little mimics children can be. That means that if you want to encourage them in a certain direction, you need to provide an example for them. This is particularly important when they are young. As your kids get older, they’ll look to others, including peers, celebrities, and other authority figures for cues as to how to behave and what their values are. You can give them a solid head start by demonstrating the behaviors and values that you want to encourage early on. This including exhibiting healthy behaviors and encouraging them to do the same.
Dental Health
It can be a triumph just to get your children to brush their teeth daily. But you can encourage good dental practices as part of your everyday routine. This might include conversations about why too much sugar isn’t great for the teeth or how regular brushing keeps them in good condition. It’s also about making dental visits a regular part of their lives. Dentists can be intimidating and even fear-inducing. Starting routine visits early helps eliminate that fear. You can begin with the first visit soon after the first tooth comes in. As your kids get older, talk about the visits as something that’s exciting and fun, not something that they should dread. Of course, choosing a child friendly dentist is important as well. The dentist can help in educating them about tooth care and building good oral health habits.
This familiarity can help ensure that if the time does come that your child needs some dental work, they won’t feel as much stress about it. You may worry about how to pay for these visits, particularly since dental care may not be included as part of your overall health insurance. Fortunately, there is now an option with Cherry Financing. This allows you to take your kids to the dentist now and pay for it in installments over several months. You can ask your practice for a unique link or find it yourself online. Your credit score won’t be impacted when you apply for a payment plan. Making regular visits yourself helps to demonstrate that this is a routine part of life. If you do have your own fears of the dentist, which is not uncommon among adults, avoid discussing them in front of your children.
Nutrition
They say that variety is the spice of life. It’s also one of the keys to a nutritional diet. This can be frustrating when it comes to children since many prefer to eat the same things repeatedly. Food and children can feel like a fraught combination since you are supposed to do so many things that feel contradictory. You’re supposed to make sure that they eat healthy food, but you aren’t supposed to stress them out about mealtimes. You should get them to try new things, but you shouldn’t make them eat things they don’t want.
The first thing you should do is keep your pediatrician’s recommendations in mind rather than panicking about something you heard from another parent or saw on social media. But you can also set an example by trying different foods yourself and talking about food in a way that is positive. You can give them new things to try on a regular basis without turning it into a battle.
Movement
Since the days when televisions became common fixtures in family homes, parents have been nagging their kids to get outside and get some exercise. Phones, tablets and video games are just the most recent versions of temptations that keep kids more sedentary than they should be. If your child isn’t naturally inclined to be active, you can turn family time into movement time.
Instead of a movie night, consider family walks around the block or having everyone ride bicycles together. You can even encourage your children to move around and do activities like jumping jacks or running in place when they’re feeling strong emotions, whether that’s anger or excitement. This can help to channel all that energy and provide them with a good coping strategy.
Mindset
Mindset is an important aspect of health. Think about what your words and actions demonstrate to your child in terms of how you rise to challenges. This is another area where you might have some struggles of your own, but unless your kids are older and you can discuss it with more complexity, it’s best to try to demonstrate resilience and resolve.
Consider as well how you can teach them that it’s okay to take part in an activity and not be very good at it or even to try something and fail. You can even try an activity together that you aren’t good at. When your child sees you trying to play a game and laughing at yourself when you make mistakes, they get the message that it’s okay to look or feel foolish, awkward, or unsure at times. They also learn that it’s possible for them to enjoy themselves despite those feelings.
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