182 Diet Wise
Games and rewards
There is no doubt at all that the best way to ensure the cooperation of
children is to induce them to follow the diet on the strength of their own
decision to do so. One of the best ways to do this is to make it into a game.
If there are rewards for eating properly, commensurate with their idea of
the effort involved, it will usually be a success. There are as many ways to do
this as there are children, but it is a good idea to have rewards on a day-to-
day basis, since the attention span of youngsters is notoriously short.
This can be followed up by a larger prize for achieving a whole
week of successes. The old black marks and stars idea is good for many
more miles yet. There could be stars for each successful day and a gold star
for the week. Black marks would, needless to say, go unrewarded and would
jeopardize the weekly score, which should be punishment enough in itself.
This is far more satisfactory than the use of force or punishment to
ensure compliance, which smothers initiative; besides, the child may reason
that the diet is worse than any punishment you might inflict, in which case
you cannot hope to succeed! But a much more important point is that he
or she will have enough to cope with that is unpleasant, at least for the
first few days, without your adding disciplinary actions to the misery. Have
confidence in your child: it is amazing the number of frightful, disobedient
monsters that settle down and become placid and sociable after a few days
without junk food and sugar pep.
You could be in for a pleasant surprise, but you will never know
unless you loosen the reins a little.
It might seem silly to point it out, but perhaps it needs saying:
sweets and other diet items should not form part of a reward system. Try
to cultivate the point of view that they are harmful, not something kind
parents give out. Thus don’t be tempted into making sweets the big reward
when it is all over – that encourages the wrong attitude. You want the child
to completely change his or her thinking, permanently, not just ‘until it’s all
over.’ You see, the chances will be quite high of having to go on avoiding
certain foods if the child is to remain healthy, so in that sense it will never
be ‘all over.’ Perhaps you need to revise your own thinking on the topic, too.
School meals
It is definitely easier to manage the diet of pre-school youngsters than that
of older children: at home you at least have a fighting chance of controlling
what they eat. School meals are particularly disastrous and must be avoided