Celebrate Feeding

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Celebrate Feeding CELEBRATE Feeding! This work is led by a research team at MSVU and UPEI and funded by CIHR.

supports child care centres by providing hands-on coaching, professional development, and resources to create an enriched and responsive feeding environment.

Great opportunity to talk about responsive feeding and our Celebrate Feeding project at a PD session hosted by the Assoc...
16/11/2024

Great opportunity to talk about responsive feeding and our Celebrate Feeding project at a PD session hosted by the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Nova Scotia.

Check out another new infographic summary of our paper on our modified version of the   tool used to document responsive...
05/09/2024

Check out another new infographic summary of our paper on our modified version of the tool used to document responsive feeding behaviours in early learning centres across Nova Scotia and PEI. Click the link in our bio to find the full article on our website!

Our team is happy to share this infographic on our newest publication surrounding our CELEBRATE Feeding approach to food...
03/09/2024

Our team is happy to share this infographic on our newest publication surrounding our CELEBRATE Feeding approach to food and feeding in early learning settings. Check out the link in our story to read the full article!

WOW! What an event! Last week, the CELEBRATE Feeding project hosted a collaborative workshop to bring together our proje...
11/12/2023

WOW! What an event!

Last week, the CELEBRATE Feeding project hosted a collaborative workshop to bring together our project participants, partners, and researchers.

We wanted to create a space to share the successes and challenges of our CELEBRATE intervention. We also delved into some exciting preliminary results, coaching resources & supports, and steps for the future.

The workshop gave us an opportunity to collaborate across groups and explore the pathway to growing the project even bigger.

What a day it was! Swipe through to check out some awesome collaboration!

Supporting kids in deciding what and how much to eat can be tough! Especially when there is not endless supplies of food...
28/09/2023

Supporting kids in deciding what and how much to eat can be tough! Especially when there is not endless supplies of food.

Here’s our Coaching Cue 🌟 to help you manage this in a more responsive way 👇

🌟Tell children they can pick what they want from what is being served AND let them know they are responsible for ensuring they leave some fro friends

🌟Tell kids there will be more available if your centre has extra food

🌟Talk about the foods being served without pressruing them to eat them, descirbe the texture, colour, taste

🌟Prompt kids to think about how full their belly is

🌟Avoid projecting how much you think a child should or should not eat

🌟if there are limited amounts of a food, prompt them to start with a servign size that allows everyone to get some “so our friends can all try some if they want to”

🚨 Coaching cue 🚨Responding to a child saying “I don’t want that” at a meal. 🌟 Support the child by helping them understa...
17/08/2023

🚨 Coaching cue 🚨

Responding to a child saying “I don’t want that” at a meal.

🌟 Support the child by helping them understand they never have to eat
anything they don’t want

🌟Remain neutral when talking about foods and offering other options. Use this an opportunity to teach them all foods are allowed and can fuel us.

🌟Explore reasons why they may not like something or how you can help make it taste better with dips, shapes, sprinkles, pairing with something else.

🌟Teach them about the food, where it grows, what it comes from, how it is made.

🌟Share when the next eating time will be and what will be served is important to help reduce mealtime stress for kids.

What are family 👨‍👩‍👧‍👧 style meals? Family-style meals 🍽️ are those that serve food to the table in large plates and bo...
03/08/2023

What are family 👨‍👩‍👧‍👧 style meals?

Family-style meals 🍽️ are those that serve food to the table in large plates and bowls giving everyone an opportunity to select and serve what they want.

Using this method with children encourages food autonomy and creates a more responsive feeding environment. Using family-style feeding also offers a time to engage in mealtime manners, cognitive growth, motor growth, and mealtime confidence that can help children explore new taste and textures.

Our project concept uses the foundation of family-style serving to create more opportunity for children to serve themselves and develop positive mealtime experiences.

Here are our top tips 👇

🥣2-3 smaller bowls vs 2 big serving bowl

Smaller plastic bowls and serving tools

Encourage 1-2 scoops to start

Pause family-style when sickness is high

Facilitate play related to food and family-style serving

Check out the link in our bio to learn more about our project!

Let’s Get Cooking!Involving kids in age-appropriate kitchen activities is a great way to offer pressure free and fun exp...
24/07/2023

Let’s Get Cooking!

Involving kids in age-appropriate kitchen activities is a great way to offer pressure free and fun exposure to food.

Here are some of our favourites!

🍋SQUEEZE! Squeezing is a good way to expose kids to textures and sensations around food.

📏MEASURE! Dry and liquid measuring can help improve motor control, learning numbers, and food characteristics.

🍽️PLATE! Get kids to plate foods as long as they aren’t hot or delicate foods that need precision.

👅 TASTE! Offering a pressure free opportunity to taste (safe/cooked/clean) ingredients and final products allows them to explore how food changes in cooking.

🌿GARNISH! Give them the opportunity to sprinkle on some finishing touches and explains the colours, textures, and tastes these garnishes offer.

🥧KNEAD! Have a pizza or pie session and get those little hands working! Another way to offer sensory experience and creativity.

🥄STIR & MIX! The perfect intro activity for kids in the kitchen. It may get messy but this is a great exposure method, motor skill developer, and action at any age.

Get your kiddos cooking and keep the experience pressure free! Encourage creativity and exploration without any pressure to east/taste the foods.

Let us know what you like to cook with kiddos!

How can you better respond to children’s eating behaviours to be more responsive? Swipe through to check out our coachin...
20/07/2023

How can you better respond to children’s eating behaviours to be more responsive?

Swipe through to check out our coaching cues!

🍴Ensure children know they don’t have to eat if their belly does not feel hungry

🍴Tell children when their next chance to eat will be and what will be offered

🍴Offer them the foods they prefer with other foods

🍴Offer other foods without pressure

🍴allow them to leave the table when they are done

🍴Let children decide when they are done

🍴use neutral language around food

🍴avoid pressuring them to try foods

🍴avoid food/intake related praise or cheerleading, this can be perceived as pressure by children

🍴offer different ways to explore a food like smell or touch

🍴use neural comments or no comments around intake (Ex “what do you think about the food?”)

Let us help you unpack mealtime praise and why it is discouraged when we are aiming to be more responsive in our feeding...
28/06/2023

Let us help you unpack mealtime praise and why it is discouraged when we are aiming to be more responsive in our feeding practices!

Bottom line is maintaining neutrality with food for kiddos.

Click through and let us know what ya think!

Exposing kids to new foods is more than just eating!When we help kids explore a new food in ways that aren’t eating, we ...
22/06/2023

Exposing kids to new foods is more than just eating!

When we help kids explore a new food in ways that aren’t eating, we offer a pressure free way for them to be exposed to it. This helps create a more positive experience with a food. This can make a kid feel more comfortable actually trying the food later.

Learn - plan a lesson around the food

Plate - plate the food but never pressure them to eat it. Try plating a small portion of a new food with some of the foods they do like

Touch - explore the texture of the new food, ask what it feels like. Soft, hard, smooth, etc.

Read - find a book talking about the food

Craft - use the food in a craft or model a craft after the food

Smell - smell the food and explore the sensations

Look - observe the food with no pressure to eat it

Cook - try cooking a new recipe with the food. Include kids with age appropriate tasks like mixing, slicing, stirring.

Lick - licking or using the tongue to wean into actually chewing and eating a food is good method to use with kids who are willing. No pressure should be used.

Giving kids the autonomy to experience a food without the pressure to eat it is a fantastic way to make them feel more comfortable with new things. Remember that more exposures through time can mean more receptivity to trying eventually.

Let us know what you think!

Joyful eating, swift through for our CELEBRATE Feeding Crash course! Thanks to our registered dietitian feeding coaches ...
06/06/2023

Joyful eating, swift through for our CELEBRATE Feeding Crash course! Thanks to our registered dietitian feeding coaches for this!

Like & follow for more!

Check out these cool tools! Having the appropriate mealtime tools is a fantastic way to help kids celebrate feeding! Pro...
31/05/2023

Check out these cool tools!

Having the appropriate mealtime tools is a fantastic way to help kids celebrate feeding! Proper tools give them autonomy and confidence at mealtime.

Tools may include kiddo sized items like utensils, cups, lids, plates, items with extra grips and smaller proportions, and fun serving additions.

Check out these cool kiddo sized utensils that are designed for better grip. They offer kid sized ergonomics and help build coordination skills and positive mealtime experiences.

What mealtime tools have you tried? Let us know!

Want to know more about the CELEBRATE Feeding Project? Our website is the perfect place to go! 🌟Get updates on the CELEB...
22/05/2023

Want to know more about the CELEBRATE Feeding Project?

Our website is the perfect place to go!

🌟Get updates on the CELEBRATE Feeding project goals

🌟Meet the team

🌟Learn more about the project and responsive feeding

🌟FREE resources and downloadable handouts

Navigate on over to our website, link in bio!

May is Celiac awareness month! Celiac is an autoimmune disease that causes damage to the small intestine. Gluten-contain...
19/05/2023

May is Celiac awareness month!

Celiac is an autoimmune disease that causes damage to the small intestine. Gluten-containing foods trigger the disease and avoiding all gluten is the only current treatment for people with celiac.

Gluten is in foods like breads, baked goods, cereals, pasta, condiments, crackers, snacks, and many more unless they are made with gluten-free alternatives.

Education children on dietary restrictions is so important to help celebrate the dietary needs of all people. Educating them in an age appropriate manner allows for a more positive feeding environment that can help keep everyone safe and happy.

Check out this full post to see how you can help children understand dietary needs like Celiac!

🍽️COACHING CUE🍽️A coaching cue to kick your Friday off! The WHY and HOW of facilitating non-mealtime food exposure for c...
12/05/2023

🍽️COACHING CUE🍽️

A coaching cue to kick your Friday off!

The WHY and HOW of facilitating non-mealtime food exposure for children.

When we facilitate exposure to food outside of a meal, we remove the pressure to eat that children sometimes feel when they are at the table. Perceived pressure can make a mealtime hard for children and make it a not so fun experience for everyone.

Non-mealtime food exposure can be in our language around foods, in our play kitchen, at circle time, in books, in the garden, in arts & crafts, and even just conversations outside of mealtime.

Give the non-mealtime food exposure method a try and let us know how it goes!

Happy Friday!

🌍 Celebrate diversity 🌎 Celebrating diversity is a huge part of our projects goals and such an important aspect of food ...
08/05/2023

🌍 Celebrate diversity 🌎

Celebrating diversity is a huge part of our projects goals and such an important aspect of food and feeding as well!

Food is a large part of what makes up diversity, how we eat, what we eat, and when we eat. Celebrating the food part of diversity isn’t just eating though, it’s the bigger picture of how we can help teach kiddos that diversity, especially in food is an awesome thing we can celebrate at mealtime and beyond!

COACHING CUES:

🌍Check your menu for foods with different origins

🌍Have fun conversations using a map or globe about where various foods are from

🌍Check produce stickers and help kiddos explore where the fruit/veg is from. Chat about the climate and where those foods grow.

🌍Facilitate conversations around the different cultures and occasions the kiddos have, the things they eat, what they like.

Diversity in food is a fantastic way to celebrate and embrace the differences amongst kiddos. Making mealtime and playtime more inclusive and pressure free space around food allowing us to help facilitate curiosity that helps kids grow and develop their understanding of food and how/why we eat things.

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