How we can create a safe food environment

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 During this module of instruction, you will identify the actions you can take in your home to ensure your child has access to safe and healthy food.  For example, you can ban junk and heavily processed foods that have little or no nutritional value to reduce your child’s exposure to heavy metals. It is important to reduce your child’s exposure to these heavy metals because they contribute to the development of several learning disabilities and increase risk of chronic diseases. You can also increase your child’s intake of the nutrients needed for proper gene function by ensuring your cupboards and refrigerator include a variety of foods high in methyl group nutrients, zinc, and calcium. Studies have shown that children will not eat healthy foods if they are not available at home. To encourage your child to develop healthy eating habits, you can prepare and serve meals that are high in the nutrients needed to support their immune systems and eliminate toxic substances they may have been exposed to in their environment. Children will eat healthy food if they become hungry and there is nothing else to eat. Most importantly you can model healthy eating behavior for your child as s/he will mirror your healthy eating habits. 

  1. Recognize the changes that can be made to ensure a safe and healthy food environment in your home.

2. Describe how healthy eating habits develop in a child.

3. Explain the advantages of eating healthy.

4. Become familiar with the resources in your community that will assist you in creating a healthy food environment.

5. Explain how you can improve your child’s health outcome. 

1. Read Chapter 6 of your textbook. 

2. Review the CDC Healthy Food Environment web page at the following link. Which of the strategies for creating and maintaining a healthy food environment may apply to your community? https://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/healthy-food-environments/index.html

3. Create a form to use in conducting a kitchen survey to identify and list any foods that may contain harmful food ingredients or residues. Column 1: Product/Food Name, Column 2: Ingredient, Column 3: Harmful Why? Use the form to survey your kitchen cupboards, refrigerator and freezer.

4. Participate in the weekly zoom discussion meeting. There are three questions. Prepare your responses in advance.

1. What evidence is there to suggest that parents can influence their child’s dietary habits and health outcomes?

2. Based on your survey results, think back to when you first started this tutorial and answer the following question: how has your food environment changed at home over the last six weeks?

3. Share with your course mates what you have learned in this course about the influence of diet on child health.

This tutorial was used in a clinical trial where parents of children with autism and ADHD learned how to create a safe food environment at home.  To learn more, please read the easy to read article at this link: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10845225/

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