Post by beth on Sept 7, 2005 14:53:00 GMT 10
Mel, this is drastic, but it WORKS - we do it at my workplace. Prepare your meals as you want - if the kids don't like the meal that night, they have "bread and spreads". It's nutritious enough that they won't starve, and you don't have to worry about the hassle of cooking different meals for different people or not preparing things because they say they won't eat it. Make the bread and spreads "boring" - no meats or cheeses, just bread (can be toasted) with margarine and jams and peanut butter. They may not mind at first, but they'll get tired of it and come around!
It does work - you just have to be willing to stick to it.
Another thing that works is a reward system - but YOU have to do the hard work there, too, in that you have to be consistent.
If the kids are really picky, do a reward system for their eating habits.
Without knowing your family, this is the sort of thing we would do at work:
For every complete meal eaten, a child gets a point (or a star).
For every new food the child TRIES - and I mean tries, not takes an ant-sized bite - another point/star.
You CANNOT take points/stars away once they are earned, and you cannot give them if the child has not earned them - no matter how tempting.
Make a rewards system.
Our guys have to get a certain number of points each day, for example, to have a glass of Coke/Sprite with their meal. This works because a) they don't have enough money to buy their own and b) they like getting things for free. ;-) The daily reward can be anything but keep it really small - one guy uses every day that he gets all his points as 50c towards his bus fare, which he cannot 'cash in' til he gets to $10, so maybe you could do that - a chart where the kid keeps track of all those 50c rewards til he/she has enough to buy a toy or whatever HE/SHE wants.
The second part of the reward scheme is that there is a long-term reward as well, because the kids may not get the daily one and those points have to be used somehow. Make it achievable - i.e., the kid needs to be able to earn it, earning all his/her points, in no more than two weeks.
Vital:
The reward HAS to be something the kid wants. It cannot be something we want the kid to want.
You can't do it as a punishment - phrase it so that it's a reward - "when you have earned x points we can do that" or "you can have that".
And, as the kid is earning the reward on a regular basis, over a period of weeks, you would make it slightly harder, so that perhaps it takes a minimum of three weeks to earn the reward. Also, review the rewards regularly, say monthly, BUT the kid cannot change his mind halfway through earning a reward and say "I want that instead". He/she has to EARN it by basically starting at 0 points prior to saving for the item/activity.
I know this sounds complicated. I can make it less so - it is so really simple. It works, too. We've used it on some teenaged and older boys/men who are not very nice people, and it works.
If you or anyone is interested, let me know and I'll start a thread on it that hopefully makes it clearer.
It does work - you just have to be willing to stick to it.
Another thing that works is a reward system - but YOU have to do the hard work there, too, in that you have to be consistent.
If the kids are really picky, do a reward system for their eating habits.
Without knowing your family, this is the sort of thing we would do at work:
For every complete meal eaten, a child gets a point (or a star).
For every new food the child TRIES - and I mean tries, not takes an ant-sized bite - another point/star.
You CANNOT take points/stars away once they are earned, and you cannot give them if the child has not earned them - no matter how tempting.
Make a rewards system.
Our guys have to get a certain number of points each day, for example, to have a glass of Coke/Sprite with their meal. This works because a) they don't have enough money to buy their own and b) they like getting things for free. ;-) The daily reward can be anything but keep it really small - one guy uses every day that he gets all his points as 50c towards his bus fare, which he cannot 'cash in' til he gets to $10, so maybe you could do that - a chart where the kid keeps track of all those 50c rewards til he/she has enough to buy a toy or whatever HE/SHE wants.
The second part of the reward scheme is that there is a long-term reward as well, because the kids may not get the daily one and those points have to be used somehow. Make it achievable - i.e., the kid needs to be able to earn it, earning all his/her points, in no more than two weeks.
Vital:
The reward HAS to be something the kid wants. It cannot be something we want the kid to want.
You can't do it as a punishment - phrase it so that it's a reward - "when you have earned x points we can do that" or "you can have that".
And, as the kid is earning the reward on a regular basis, over a period of weeks, you would make it slightly harder, so that perhaps it takes a minimum of three weeks to earn the reward. Also, review the rewards regularly, say monthly, BUT the kid cannot change his mind halfway through earning a reward and say "I want that instead". He/she has to EARN it by basically starting at 0 points prior to saving for the item/activity.
I know this sounds complicated. I can make it less so - it is so really simple. It works, too. We've used it on some teenaged and older boys/men who are not very nice people, and it works.
If you or anyone is interested, let me know and I'll start a thread on it that hopefully makes it clearer.