Between the ages of six and 15, your child will grow physically, mentally and emotionally. And along with that growth comes a range of possible health issues.
Healthy eating
A healthy diet with all the right nutrients is essential as your child grows.
The best way to combat childhood obesity is to ensure they eat five portions of fruit and veg a day, and eat regular meals including breakfast, lunch, dinner and healthy snacks. There are some quick and tasty recipes that'll make healthy eating easy in Food for all the family.
Exercise
If children eat more calories than they burn they will put on weight. You can help by encouraging them to be as active as possible and building physical activity into family life. Walking to school or playing sports are great ways to help them to keep fit. All children should be active for at least one hour a day. For most children, simply running around a park or playing in a playground is a real joy.
The Mend Programme (Mind, Exercise, Nutrition – Do it!) is part of a national initiative offering free healthy lifestyle courses for 7 to 13 year olds that are above a healthy weight and their families in more than 250 locations across the UK. MEND in North Somerset run various projects across the region.
There are many other useful leaflets and websites that can help parents and carers to support their children:-
- Change for Life website
- Supporting children and young people's health leaflet
- How much exercise should my child do? - NHS website
Headlice
Most children get headlice at some point but there are various websites that can help you:-
- How to treat nits - NHS website
- Department of Health leaflet
Stopping smoking
If you smoke you should protect your child from secondhand smoke. This is called passive smoking and it means your child will breathe in your smoke which could increase the risk of them becoming ill. Even if you smoke outside they can still smell the smoke.
Contact your doctor or local free stop smoking service who can help you to break the habit. Alternatively, visit the smoke free pages on the NHS website.