Food Aversion and Kitchen Connoisseurs
Kitchen Connoisseurs is a
nutritional/feeding class offered by FTS that will address the lack of such
programs in Craven County and the surrounding areas for special needs
children. Kitchen Connoisseurs will
address the problem of food aversion with problem feeders. Many times, problem
resistant eaters are simply thought of as “very picky eaters;” this is not the
case. Quite often, children are
resistant eaters because of an underlying fundamental problem- usually
oral-motor delay or sensory integration dysfunction-, which
restricts food selection. These
problems with food can become emotionally challenging and stressful to all
involved- the child, the caretaker, and any others who join at mealtime. Furthermore, food aversions can lead to poor
health. The foods many resistant eaters
choose tend to be fried or sweet. With
poor food choices, children will not get all the vitamins and minerals they
require as they grow and develop.
Unfortunately,
resistant eating has no single diagnostic test. The realization of a problem must come from caretaker
observation. Often times these children
have associated medical diagnoses, such as cerebral palsy, mental retardation,
and autism, just to name a few.
Consequently, medical doctors often address the primary medical
diagnoses, but leave the associated problems, including feeding disorders, to
the parents and therapists. These disorders
have numerous symptoms and pathologies, including coughing and choking during
meals, poor oral-motor skill acquisition, food refusals, and oral aversion just
to name a few.
|
Physicians and parents can identify these
traits in problem feeders: ·
Restricted range of foods (less than 20) ·
Child falls apart or tantrums when presented with new foods ·
Refuses entire categories of textures ·
Adds new foods to diet in greater than 25 steps ·
Gets burned-out on a food and will not add it back to diet |
Physicians and parents can identify these
traits in picky eaters: · Have
a decreased variety of foods (less than 30) · Able
to tolerate new foods on plate, by touch, or by taste · Eats
at least one food from most food textures · Adds
new foods to repertoire in 15-25 steps ·
Gets burned-out on a food, but adds it back to diet after 2
weeks |
Programs
like Kitchen Connoisseurs help parents to deal with the various problems of
food aversion and problem feeders, including children’s tantrums associated
with trying new foods. Kitchen Connoisseurs has five stages to help
overcome the eating hurdle: Acceptance, Touch, Smell, Taste, and Eating New
Foods. Each stage of sensory
development for eating has an outlined treatment plan designed to achieve the
goals of that particular stage. Each
week’s activities, additionally, will be centered on making healthy food
fun. Since many resistant eaters tend
to eat sweets and fried foods, we will introduce fruits and vegetable to their
diet. Expanding the variety of foods
that these children are willing to eat will be a great benefit in the long run,
since less than one-third of adult Americans get the recommended amount of
fruits in vegetables in their diets[1]. We try very hard to not only help these
children with sensory integration related problems, but also to teach them the
importance of good nutrition.
Our goals are that after a child’s completion of
the program, he/she will have increased the number of foods in his/her diet,
and will also be willing to try new food items in the future.
In addition to increasing the variety of foods consumed, a second
outcome of Kitchen Connoisseurs will be to educate participants and their
families about healthy eating. We will
teach the importance of good nutrition and eating according to the Food
Pyramid. Unhealthy eating can lead to a
number of diseases, including obesity, heart disease, eating disorders, and
diabetes, which is a rising concern, especially in rural areas such as
these. Statistics released from the NC
Department of Health and Human Resources in May 2007 indicate that 4,437 public
school children in North Carolina had been diagnosed with diabetes. Adding new foods and working to incorporate
items from all of the food groups will help to alleviate this and other
preventable medical problems resulting from an unhealthy lifestyle within
Craven County and the surrounding areas.
Kitchen Connoisseurs has five stages to help
overcome the eating hurdle: Acceptance, Touch, Smell, Taste, and Eating New
Foods. Each stage of sensory
development for eating has an outlined treatment plan designed to achieve the
goals of that particular stage. While
the complete list of activities (or steps) in the treatment plan is too long to
list, several examples can help generate a general idea of the different activities
the group will incorporate.
Some examples
include:
·
Give each
child a whole food (orange, watermelon, avocado, cucumber, corn in the husk,
apple) and discuss the textures of the outside. Cut open each food and count seeds. Pass the food around so all can experience the new food. Use the seeds to plant in a garden or in a
small flowerpot.
·
Play food bingo. Use plastic food as markers. Each time the child gets a match, they smell
and hold the actual food item.
·
Bite Art
o Gather 3-5 foods hard enough to bite (apples,
carrots, cucumbers, cheese, slice of bread, or a slice of lunch meat)
o Bite into the food and show off the “Bite Art”
If you
think you have a problem feeder or even just a picky eater on your hands, or
you need help getting your child to eat the right foods, please give us the
chance to help. Our classes and lesson plans are well researched and
professional. We are fully confident that our class can improve your child’s
nutritional intake and make meal time more fun and certainly make it easier on
the child and caregiver.
Please feel free to contact our
office with further questions. Call Megan or Nancy @ (252)
672-8676.
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Kitchen Connoisseurs page