1. Family meals are an important opportunity to get the whole family together!

Firstly, a regular family meal is a great way to encourage all the family members to share time together, in the same room, at the same time.

It is a time when young children learn to eat new foods, learn to share, learn to sit still. A chance for teenagers to chat about their day, share their concerns and ask for advice. And it is a great opportunity for parents to lead by example, inviting children to taste new foods and encourage conversation.

2. Serving healthy family meals can have a lasting effect!

It may sound blatantly obvious, but is important that we serve healthy meals at family dinners, even if these are not always the popular option!

What we serve at the family meal will affect not just the food we eat that evening, but can shape our diets in the future.

For example, research shows that teenagers who ate less than 3 fast-food family meals a week were significantly more likely to continue eating more vegetables and calcium rich foods as young adults.

Encourage your family to eat the same meal at the same time.

By encouraging children to eat the same food as adults at family meals, we can increase the variety of our children’s diet. Children often mimic parent’s food preferences, especially when these are discussed at shared meals. Eating the same food as parents is the aspect of family meals most strongly linked to healthier diets! Do remember to use low salt cooking methods and sauces when cooking for young children!

3. Getting everyone involved in the meal prep has more benefits than just speeding up the process!

Next, I encourage you to get the whole family involved in choosing and preparing meals! There is so much learning to be done in the simple acts of grocery shopping and food preparations. From learning to plan ahead when making grocery lists, to getting to grips with handling cutlery and cooking utensils, important life skills are to be gained!

And did you know that children who help to prepare a meal are much more likely to eat it? Let alone the benefits on self-esteem that come from serving one of their own prepared dishes.

So, we have the family together, got the children to help prepare the meal and made sure to put nutritious and delicious food on the table…

4. Now we need to make sure the meal-time environment is right.

That means, turn off the TV!

Over one third of households have their TV on during dinner, and studies have shown that children who watch TV during their meals are less likely to eat their veggies and more likely to eat fatty foods and be at risk of being overweight.  

Also, encourage conversation!

Young children thrive by engaging in dinnertime conversation, even more than from parents reading bedtime stories. Children learn approximately 1,000 rare words at the dinner table compared to 140 from bedtime reading. Studies also show that teenagers can learn important problem solving skills from dinner time discussion. They learn to listen to other people’s concerns and respect other people’s tastes.

5. Finally, the last step in boosting the effects of a family meal time is simply believing in their importance!

 It has been shown that the more strongly we believe in the importance of the family meal the more likely we are to schedule regular family dinners.

So in order to squeeze the most benefits out of our family meals, we should remember that:

1. Getting the family together allows for a whole heap of learning to happen!
2. What we serve for dinner makes a difference! Choose healthy, fresh foods and try to get the whole family to eat the same meal each night.
3. Get everyone involved in all aspects of the meal, from grocery shopping, to meal prep. We will discuss some useful meal planning tips in our next video!
4. Get the meal time environment right. That means, less TV and more conversation!
5. Remind yourself of the importance of family meals.