Kids Need Water Not Fruit Juice

Fruit juice may taste great to your child, but it's loaded with sugars that can contribute to adverse health conditions like obesity, tooth decay, and overall poor nutrition. 

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recent recommendations state that fruit juice should not be given to infants under 12 months of age because it offers no nutritional benefit to them. Water and breast milk should be the preferred drink. 

After 12 months of age, the AAP sates that infants can be given limited amounts of juice each day but advices that for all age groups:

• Fruit juice offers no nutritional benefits over whole fruits. Whole fruits and vegetables have nutrients and fiber while fruit juice is loaded with quick processing sugars (this includes fruit juices that have no sugar added).
• Children should not be given fruit juice at bedtime or as a treatment or management for diarrhea.
• For children ages one through 6 years of age it's still recommended to limit fruit juice to no more than 4 ounces per day. Read the label and make sure it is 100% fruit juice, a lot of juices are loaded with sugar and have very little 'real' juice if any. It should also be pasteurized for safety and don't give juice in a sippy cup or bottle, this is very important for preventing cavities.

These are guidelines — and with any guideline, there may be exceptions (if your child is on an iron supplement, for example, your doctor may want you to give it with orange juice). If you have questions about this recommendation, or anything else about what your child should eat or drink, talk to your pediatrician.

Here is the American Academy of Pediatrics policy statement on fruit juice: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/139/6/e20170967

Social and Emotional Learning

Meeting children's social emotional learning (SEL) needs in preschool can enable them to thrive mentally, physically, and academically in kindergarten and well beyond into adulthood. 

Developing social-emotional skills during preschool includes being able to get along and cooperate with others, manage strong feelings, focus attention, and persist at challenging tasks.

Social emotional skills developed during the preschool years are important because they are critical for long-term school and life success. Early development of these skills is reached to have a number of positive adult outcomes, including: good physical and mental health, interpersonal relationships, education, employment, and more.

In conclusion, preschool SEL programming has the potential to reduce the school readiness gap and help children become healthy, thriving adults.

Kids Love to Dance!

Kids love moving to music and there can be nothing more fun than dancing! Whether your child is in formal ballet lessons or just likes jamming out with the family to your favorite tunes, there's no doubt that a love of dance is a fantastic way for kids to have fun, express their creativity and exercise!!

If you're looking for some illustrative books that inspire and invoke the imagination of dance and movement for your little ones, here's our top list. These colorful stories will delight children that love to step, twirl, plie and jump! 

Baby Dance by Ann Taylor is a perfect book for reading aloud or dancing to! Ages: 0-2

I Can Dance by Betsy Snyder is an interactive board book with cut holes so kids can use their fingers to get into the dance groove. A great way to add fun into story time. Ages 1-3

Do Princesses Boogie? by Carmela LaVigna Coyle is a fun, rhythmic, read-aloud book that will have your child dancing along. Ages 3-5

Kitchen Dance by Maurie Manning is a celebration of family dancing together and is one of our favorite books for young readers. Ages 3-6

Flora and the Flamingo by Molly Idle is a wordless picture book about a girls amazing interaction with a flamingo. Fans of Flora will love this and the whole series. Ages 3-7

Thunderstorm Dancing by Katrina Germein is an energetic story that will get everyone moving the next time they hear thunder in the distance. Ages 4-7

Ruby Rose Off to School She Goes by Rob Sanders is full of silly humor and esxaggerated fun, your dance-loving kids will love this book. Ages 4-8

Dance Is For Everyone by Andrea Zuill is larger than life and full of laughs. The book celebrates passion wherever it may lie. Ages 4-8

Other favorites for ages 4-8: My Mama Had a Dancing Heart, Dancing in the Wings, Frances Dean Who Loved to Dance and Dance, Brontorina, Deer Dancer, Jingle Dancer, Suki's Kimono, Firebird.

Happy dancing and reading everyone!  

Attributes of Bravery

Make time to watch "The Gutsy Girl" author Caroline Paul's talk on raising brave girls and boys. Get inspired by the power of adventure and productive risk-taking, no matter your age or gender! Parents: she provides references and resources for further learning on microbavery and resilience.

The fear we learn and the caution stays with us into adulthood -- hesitation in speaking out and our lack of confidence in our own decisions. So how do we raise brave kids?

Here are Caroline's key points on how kids become brave: 

Bravery is learned and like anything learned, it needs to be practiced. Take a deep breath and encourage your kids to skateboard, climb trees etc - studies show that risky play teaches hazard assessment, delayed gratification, resilience and confidence. When kids get outside and practice bravery, they learn invaluable life lessons.

Try and not over caution our kids, because then you're telling them that they shouldn't keep pushing themselves, that they're not good enough, that they shouldn't be brave. 

Moms and dads (especially moms) have to start practicing bravery too. We can't teach our kids unless we practice it ourselves. So practice... at home, in the office, in our relationships.

Guide your kids to access their bravery, maybe the hill is too steep, but let her be guided by courage not fear to determine what's possible and what isn't. This is not about the steep hill in front of her, but about her life ahead of her. 

Watch the Ted presentation here: http://www.ted.com/talks/caroline_paul_to_raise_brave_girls_encourage_adventure?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=tedspread

Parents, How Much Do You Know About Antibiotics?

There's an effort by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to help make sure that we use antibiotics wisely. In the U.S. 1 in 5 of children visits to health care practitioners result in a prescription of antibiotics. This amounts to over 50 million prescriptions annually! Of which 10 million are for respiratory illnesses that antibiotics aren't helpful for. 

Antibiotics are of course very important and life saving when they are needed, however, their use does not come without risks including the killing off of natural bacteria that grow in our bodies and that we rely upon for forging a healthy immune system to fight off disease and infections. Antibiotic resistance is another concern of indiscriminate prescribing. 

Here's a helpful quick quiz published in Harvard Health Publications to help families make informed decisions about antibiotic use. 

Take this quick quiz to check your antibiotic smarts

Question: (True or false) Any time the doctor says your child has an ear infection, you should leave the office with a prescription for antibiotics.

Answer: False. Turns out that most ear infections get better without antibiotics. In some circumstances, such as in young infants, severe infections, or children with immune system problems, antibiotics are necessary. But for most healthy children, all that is really needed is some acetaminophen or ibuprofen for pain, some time, and some TLC.

Question:  Which of the following set of symptoms means your child has sinusitis?

A. A cough for a week, with fever at the beginning and not since

B. Green nasal discharge and cough for four days, fever to 101

C. Both of the above

D. None of the above

Answer: D. The common cold, caused by a virus, can give you cough, fever, and green nasal discharge — and antibiotics are not only unnecessary, they won’t do a thing. Antibiotics should only be considered if:

• There is nasal congestion and cough, preferably with fever, that has lasted for 10 days or more (it still may be a cold, your doctor needs to examine and be sure)
• There is new fever, congestion, and cough after a cold seemed to be getting better
• There is high fever (103 F or more) and severe congestion and cough for three days

Question: Your child has a bad sore throat and fever. You take your child to the doctor, who says that the throat is very red and has pus, but doesn’t find anything else that worries her. What should happen?

A. You should get antibiotics, because pus means there must be a bacteria

B. You should get a strep test and antibiotics

C. You should get a strep test, but no antibiotics unless the rapid strep test or culture comes back positive.

Answer: C. Turns out that pus doesn’t necessarily mean there are bacteria. Some of the nastiest throat infections are caused by viruses — which, again, antibiotics don’t treat.

Question: (True or False) Since sometimes colds can lead to ear infections or sinusitis or pneumonia, it’s a good idea to take an antibiotic to prevent that from happening.

Answer: False. While it’s really understandable to want to “be on the safe side” and ward off a bacterial infection, most colds don’t lead to bacterial infections — and if you are in touch with your doctor, you should be able to pick up the signs of anything that needs to be treated by antibiotics.

To learn more about smart use of antibiotics, check out these resources from the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

"Let Them Eat Dirt" - Book suggestion

"Let Them Eat Dirt" by Drs Marie-Clair Arrieta and Brett Finlay is a must read for parents, educators and health professionals. It's about the importance of gut bugs to a child's developing immune system and the authors explain how to give kids the best immune boost starting early in life.

Microbiome refers to all the microbes that cover our skin and inhabit our intestines. We now realize these trillions of microbes are really important for our kids' health,  for their brain, gut, and immune development. 

The authors of "Let Them Eat Dirt" explain in their book that the microbes that colonize the gut in the first 100 days help determine whether children will become obese, suffer from allergies or asthma, and essentially how well they will be able to fight off infections and disease. 

It's a compelling read with practical suggestions and answers to important questions about what influences childhood development and how microbes influence a child's susceptibility to obesity, diabetes, asthma, allergies, eczema, and other chronic conditions. The authors extrapolate the latest scientific literature to help empower parents to give their kids the healthiest start in life possible. 

Here are some of the best ways to raise your kids with a healthy dose of microbes: 

There are many things families can do to help ensure their children have a healthy microbiome, ultimately, feeding kids a diverse whole food diet that is low in sugar and high in fiber is key. Avoiding antibiotics and antiseptics unless absolutely necessary and letting your children play in dirt and go barefoot in grass are other helpful tips.

A columnist for one of the online papers made a great suggestion for picky eaters that don't love vegetables. She suggests telling kids that they have little critters living inside them and their survival is dependent on them eating vegetables. When faced with the knowledge that their little pets will die without vegetables, kids most often will opt for broccoli over fries. Might be worth a try?! 

To our kids' health! 

Prenatal Vitamins May Make Your Children Cleverer

A new study led by a research team at Harvard University has reported that taking multivitamins during pregnancy can "add the equivalent of up to a full year of schooling to a child's cognitive abilities." 

The results also found that early life factors including a nurturing environment was very important for a child's intellectual development including educational achievement and fine motor dexterity. 

The multivitamins studied contained iron, folic acid, retinol, vitamin D, vitamin E, ascorbic acid, vitamin B, niacin, zinc, copper, selenium and iodine. Maternal supplementation aided children's procedural memory by an additional 1/2 year of schooling and for anemic mothers, the effect equalled one year of extra schooling. 

In conclusion, the most impactful factors on a child's cognitive ability that trump biological factors include: nurturing home environment, parental happiness, parental education, socio-economic status. 

The research was published in the journal The Lancet Global Health. 

Drinking Water Improves Your Child's Brain Function

Children need to drink more water than adults. The effects of dehydration on a child's ability to think has been well studied and researched.

Research shows that dehydration is a common occurrence and even mild dehydration can impact a child's mental functioning. The good news is when given just a cup of water (300ml), a child's memory recall is significantly improved. 

Another study showed that children who drank additional water performed better on attention tests compared to those who didn't. 

So drinking water can have a positive impact on your child's mental performance and wile we can't make any definitive claims on increasing IQ it seems that like a good health measure to ensure your child is adequately hydrated as developing healthy hydration habits while children are young is a smart thing to do!

How Much Water Should Your Kids Be Drinking?

The Institute of Medicine of the National Academics has the following recommendation for kids:

• Infants:  breast milk is enough
• Children  1-3 yrs: 4 cups per day
• Boys and girls 4-8 yrs: 5 cups per day
• Girls 9-13 yrs: 7 cups per day
• Boys 9-13 yrs: 8 cups per day
• Girls 14-18 yrs: 8 cups per day
• Boys 14-18 yrs: 11 cups per day

(I cup = 250ml = 8 fluid ounces)

Tips to Encourage Kids to Drink More Water:

• Total water intake comes from all sources: drinking water, beverages, food with lots of water content. Offer fruits and veggies with a high water content such as apples, cabbage, cantaloupe, cherry tomatoes, celery, cucumbers, grapes, pears, sweet peppers, watermelon, zucchini. A side of soup with meals can be an easy way to increase water count.
• Encourage your children to drink water regularly throughout the day and be a good example by drinking regularly yourself!
• Use fun drinking straws, special drinking cups and colorful water bottles. Stainless steel or BPA free are the best containers. 
• During physical activity, kids need more water, especially in hot weather. Encourage another 1/2 cup for every 20mins of activity.
• It's helpful for kids to make drinking water a part of their daily routine. Encourage 1/2 to a full glass on waking, offer water with meals, snacks, and when they arrive from school, and again before they brush their teeth.
• If your child says they aren't thirsty, encourage them to have a few sips of water. Generally this will encourage them to drink more on their own. Younger kids may need to try water about a dozen times over a two week period before they start to develop a taste for it. You can infuse water with sliced lemons, limes, berries, cucumbers or sprigs of fresh mint. For older kids, you can freeze berries or sliced fruit in ice-cubes, and add these to water for a hint of flavor.
• Consider a reward system to motivate younger kids to drink such as posting stickers on a daily water log which can help (and you) track their consumption amounts. Even consider doing something special to celebrate their new healthy habit, like a trip to the water park or lake perhaps?

Empathy: Teaching Kids to Care for One Another

Denmark rates as one of the world's happiest places. It is also a country where kids are taught to care about the welfare of others.

There are several programs in Denmark aimed at increasing emotional awareness and empathy, including: how to interpret facial expressions, articulate experiences, thoughts, feelings, and senses. Danish children begin participating in these mandatory national programs as early as preschool.

One such program is called the Step by Step program where children are shown pictures of other kids' emotional expressions such as fear, anger, sadness, happiness, and so forth. The students then put into words and describe the facial expressions. Most important, the children learn not to be judgmental of the facial expressions, rather they recognize and respect them.

CAT-kit is also a very popular program that includes picture cards of faces and measuring sticks to gauge intensity of expressions as well as body pictures for the children to draw the physical aspects and location of emotions. 

My Circle is another tool used in Denmark schools. Here children draw their friends, family, and people in their community or neighbourhood as part of an exercise on learning to better understand other people, faiths, customs and more.

At Gingerbread House Daycare, our certified childhood educators draw on comparable methods to teach empathy, too. We encourage 3-5 year olds to talk about bullying and teasing and to learn to become more caring toward each other. Another less obvious manner in which our teachers help instill empathy is my subtly mixing children of different strengths and weaknesses together. Students with strong reading skills are taught alongside those who may struggle with pronunciation; shier kids with more extroverted ones; etc. The premise is for students to support each other to reach their next best level. This helps foster collaboration, teamwork, and respect.

Empathy is one of the most important life skill a person can learn. The quality fosters successful leaders, managers, and businesses. It greatly improves relationships and social connectedness. 

Maybe Canadian schools could also adopt Denmark's platform and focus on actively teaching empathy. We believe empathic kids will make happier adults.