Importance of Family Dinners
Pediatricians, psychologists, educators, and researchers all tell us that we should eat meals as a family as often as possible. But why? Why should we re-arrange our schedules so that we can eat with our families on a regular basis? What’s so important about eating together? The benefits of eating meals together might be more far-reaching than you imagine.
Healthy Eating. Parents who eat with their children are able to demonstrate healthy eating habits to their kids. Not only can parents prepare healthy meals for the family, but they can also expose their children to lots of other important skills. These might include: exercising portion control and willingness to try new foods and flavors. Even if your kids don’t seem to notice your eating habits – believe me, they are! And parents who eat healthily are more likely to raise kids who do the same.
Conversation. We live in a fast-paced, technology-heavy world where opportunities for face-to-face conversations are quickly decreasing. Eating dinner as a family provides us with the opportunity to actually talk to our kids the old fashioned way; in person. Not only are talking and listening important skills for kids to learn, family meal times can also provide parents with critical opportunities to learn what is really going on with their children. Meal times can also be good times to discuss important family business like where to take the summer vacation, share important news, and resolve conflicts between siblings.
Team work. Meal preparation is a big job. From meal planning to shopping to actually cooking the food – meal preparation takes a lot of time, energy, and money. This makes it a great opportunity for families to work together to achieve the goal of making healthy meals. Preschoolers can pitch in by setting the table, tweens can prepare a salad, and many high schoolers enjoy taking responsibility for planning and preparing entire meals. The more you engage your children in the meal preparation process, the more knowledgeable they will be.
It’s important to remember that meals don’t have to be fancy, and dinnertime doesn’t have to last for hours in order for families to enjoy eating together. Spending 10-15 minutes together eating a simple meal is all it takes to enjoy the many benefits of shared dinnertime.
For more ideas about how to make the most of mealtime visit http://www.drstephaniesmith.com/?p=370