Do you think parents should teach their kids how to count calories?

I have ideas about this, but they are unconventional. I really don't care if other people disagree with how we raised them in this regard.

We wanted our children to be able to tune into their hunger signals, and to that end, never forced meals on them or strictly imposed meal times.

They were exclusively breast fed until they reached for food on the table, and while we had regular meals, they were not obligated to eat them. Healthy food was available to them at all times if their hunger led them into a different meal timing. Unhealthy food was also available, but it was limited and offered in context (they were taught about "sometimes" and "always" foods).

Over time, they've fallen into regular meal timing, but they stop eating when they are full.

I don't know many other kids who willingly turn down cookies or sometimes only eat half and then say they've had enough.

It has worked. They are both at healthy weights. Our daughter is 21, and son is 15 and still growing.

They both have knowledge of energy balance and calories in food, but it's not really an important thing for them. I think it's more important not to mess up the internal hunger signals we all have if it can be avoided. But that's me and a projection of how I wish my own hunger signalling wasn't so messed by the rigidity of my own upbringing that didn't allow for extra hunger during growth spurts or decreased hunger between them. I understand how other people might have a different take on things.

I think nutrition classes should be a mandatory part of health education in middle and high schools. It could be tied in to math/science SOL's. Personally, I would have benefited greatly by receiving a non-judgmental, science based approach to ci/co.

No. If we teach them to make healthy choices more often, they should never need to count calories.

I think children should be taught that foods have calories and that each person needs a certain amount to fuel their body properly. I think it is worth teaching by the time you have a teen that weight maintenance, gain or loss is down to eating/burning the right number of calories not type of food so they don't feel they are doomed if they eat a cheeseburger or judgy of their classmate for eating one.
I do not think children should focus on calorie counting though unless there is a major problem. If they need to lose or gain significant weight to be at a healthy weight then they and their parent should probably be working together tracking intake and activity level.

My kid knows what a calorie is. What I have been teaching her is portion control.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
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Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

nissarayna wrote: »

No. If we teach them to make healthy choices more often, they should never need to count calories.

That's nice in theory, but some people don't get the normal "you're full" signals due to hormonal issues. In those cases, you can teach them to reach for healthy choices more often but assuming you're including more calorie dense healthy choices (e.g. nuts and nut butters) they may still have difficulty maintaining a healthy weight.

For kids (i.e. not yet teenagers), focus on making healthy choices and enjoying physical activity. The concept of "sometimes foods". Food as fuel to give them energy and make them grow strong.

But I think that most teenagers would benefit from having a general knowledge of what calories are and why they matter. I also think that teenagers who struggle to maintain a healthy weight would benefit from learning the basics of calorie counting - using maintenance calories for a healthy weight as their goal (i.e. not aiming for big deficits), maintaining a reasonable activity level (not sedentary unless medical reasons force it) and understanding that the average is what matters and that high days and low days are to be expected. I honestly wish I would have learned all of this as a teenager rather than discovering it in my mid thirties.

I'm using the child/teenager divide as a rough guide to be clear that I'm not supporting 5 year olds counting calories. Some 12 year olds are more mature than some 15 year olds. So, the parent would judge their kid's maturity level and how much detail they could handle. And if the teenager has no trouble maintaining a healthy weight intuitively, I would not suggest they start calorie counting (outside of a context like a "track your calories for a week" assignment in a health class).

I was a serious dancer in high school and college. I heard a lot about needing to lose weight (from my teacher, not my parents--I was in a healthy weight range for my height but not ballerina skinny) but nothing about how to do it healthily. I had no idea how many calories you needed to fuel 3+ hours of intensive dance classes a day so I tried cutting to an absurdly low calorie level. Fortunately I wasn't dedicated enough, crazy as that sounds, to develop a full blown eating disorder but I had no idea how to eat for weight loss until much later. I knew my mom was always dieting but never knew how that worked except that she skipped meals sometimes. Some basic education about calories and how much a young athlete needs would have been good information to have, at least in high school. Prior to puberty, I think just teaching nutrition fundamentals and listening to hunger cues while promoting fun activity is usually sufficient. I have a 2 yr old now and we offer food at fairly regular mealtimes but we don't make her clean her plate.