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How to Get Your Kids to Eat More Vegetables


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How to Get Your Kids to Eat More Vegetables

Gardening: Big Benefits for Small Bodies

Ah, spring.

After an entire winter spent cleaning up tracked-in wet messes, we can now begin to look forward to that glorious season when we can actually enjoy getting something dirty for a change. Specifically, our hands.

Potato GardenIf you’re a gardener, you know the joy that comes with digging, planting and weeding—and then watching your bounty of beauty and goodness burst forth from the ground. Oh, the gratification! It’s just somehow good for the soul. In fact, gardening is good for us in so many ways.

Turns out, it’s good for your kids too.

A 2016 study published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics shows that children who help with gardening continue to reap benefits later in life:

  • College students who learned to garden as children eat more fruits and vegetables than their peers who didn’t.
  • College students who gardened as kids eat 2.9 cups of fruits and vegetables a day, compared to the 2.4 cups eaten by those who didn’t.
  • Simply watching their parents garden didn’t seem to make any difference, nutritionally speaking. It was the hands-on experience that mattered.

Group Gardening

Aside from the increase in nutritional benefits it offers, childhood gardening, especially in community, has also been shown to help with mental and social abilities such as:

  • Positive social and interpersonal skills. Youth interns in community gardens reported increased maturity, responsibility and interpersonal skills, as well as positive bonding experiences with adults.
  • Increased achievement in science. Elementary students who participated in school gardening projects scored “significantly higher” on science achievement tests than those who had no gardening experiences.
  • Design skills and environmental stewardship. Even young children can help design gardens, and students who participated in a school gardening program also showed gains in pro-environmental attitudes.
  • Improved ecological awareness. In an intergenerational gardening project, students reported increased interconnections in nature and understanding of ecology.

Get Fruved

Get FruvedSeventy American colleges and universities and seventeen high schools are currently collaborating in a project designed to help students “Get Your Fruits and Vegetables.” The Get Fruved project uses social media, campus events and peer interaction to get high school and college students to improve dietary intake, increase physical activity and improve overall stress-management skills.

did_you_know2

Not everyone has the space to garden, but even a small patio can be a great place to grow a container garden.

comment_2How about you? Do you garden? If so, do your kids or grandkids help out too? We’d love to hear about your experiences. Just leave a comment below!

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My kids love to eat their vegetables:

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Alison Jones
Alison Jones
4 years ago

My 5.5 yo son LOVES to help garden both working with the flowers and veggies. Hes so proud when he can show people what he grew and he loves eating stuff directly from the garden!!!

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Admin
Moderator
4 years ago
Reply to  Alison Jones

Alison, thanks for your comment! So glad your little one loves to both help with the gardening and enjoy the fruits of his labor. And kudos to you for instilling his love of fresh produce!

Sandra Boyko
Sandra Boyko
4 years ago
Reply to  Alison Jones

My son loved it too, he is now grown up but he still comes and waters the garden, and picks the weeds when he is visiting. It is so nice working beside him again.

Marjorie Vale
Marjorie Vale
4 years ago

Will eat if they dont know its in food!

Autumn Enloe
Autumn Enloe
4 years ago

Gardening can really help increase the chances of the kiddos eating their veggies!

Jacqueline Morris
3 years ago

This past year we had a wonderful little garden. But Mr. Groundhog kept enjoying all the fruits of our labour. Next year we plan to hang diy Garden baskets on the fence. We are hopeful this will help keep our not so little groundhog friend out of reach.