Infanzia believes in its role in forming and motivating healthy eating habits and develops actions aimed at children and their families, as well as training its teachers.
Planning a varied menu, without ultra-processed foods, and often different from what is presented at home, has been a way of inviting our students to experiment.
Accepting a new food only happens if this food is repeatedly offered. What we see is that, when reaching a certain age group, when the child refuses to eat, they stop offering it.
In our experience, we have seen that by allowing the child to taste the same food several times and in different ways, the palate expands. The invitation to experiment is part of the dynamics of all our meals.
Food Guide for the Brazilian Population
Created in 2006 and reissued in 2014, the Food Guide for the Brazilian Population, produced by the Ministry of Health in conjunction with USP, recommends healthy eating practices, classifying foods in an unprecedented way.
The Guide takes into account the processing of food, not just its nutrients. The Guide recommends encouraging fresh foods (and culinary ingredients in smaller quantities), limiting processed foods and avoiding ultra-processed foods.
Eating well is not exactly counting calories, but eating real food.
And why is this discussion and recommendation so important for us at Infanzia? Meals at Infanzia are organized, enjoyable and promote proper nutrition. As they are done in a group, they enhance the formation of important attitudes for the development of the little ones, which we hope can be maintained in adult life.
In addition to providing a varied and balanced diet – important for body growth and development – we encourage the formation of cultural values related to food and group eating, shared eating, the pleasure of eating and pleasure at the table.
We value meal times, establishing a routine of activities to encourage adequate food consumption and also provide social interaction and exchange of experiences. During meals, children remain seated while classmates finish their meal. They talk, exchange, and support each other to experience something they are not used to.
The Culinary, Experimental Kitchen and Vegetable Garden moments also expand the children’s preferences, in addition to enabling the identification of foods.
As our nutritionist Bruna Peres reminds us, “taking care of the child’s diet continues to be a collective task shared with family members, school and other spaces where the child lives”.
The child’s relationship with food takes time to build. Eating together, talking to the child, talking about the food on the plate, smiling, praising the taste, the smell and the act of eating without help are attitudes that transform the time to eat into a positive and pleasurable moment.