1. Making mealtime joyful
Stress Free Mealtime
Making mealtime joyful

2. Goals Conduct Eating Competency Assessment View Love Parenting Video
Review Agencies that recognize Division of Responsibility as best practice
Define and understand Eating Competency
Learn Division of Responsibility for the parent and the child
Learn how to Master Meals by having pleasant mealtimes
Understand the Ages and Stages of feeding children

3. ‘‘When the joy goes out of eating, nutrition suffers
‘‘When the joy goes out of eating, nutrition suffers.’’ - Ellyn Satter Love Parenting: Stress Free Mealtimes For you and Your Child

4. Recommended as Best Practice by:
The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics
The American Academy of Pediatrics
Expert committee on child obesity
Head Start
WIC: the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children
USDA Food and Nutrition Service

5. Eating Competence Having a positive relationship with food, including:
Feeling good about food and about eating
Liking a variety of food and enjoying learning to like new food
Eating enough and being satisfied
Taking time to eat, having regular meals and snacks, and paying attention when you eat

6. Eating Competent People:
Have better diets
Have the same or lower BMI
Have better physical self acceptance
Are more active
Sleep better
Have better medical and lab tests
Do better with feeding their children

7. Division of Responsibility
Parents take leadership in
What food is provided
When serving meals and snacks
Where eating occurs
Children receive autonomy by
How much they choose to eat
Whether they choose to eat it

8. Parents’ Feeding Jobs Choose and prepare the food.
Provide regular meals and snacks.
Make eating times pleasant.
Step-by-step, show children by example how to behave at family mealtime.
Be considerate of children’s lack of food experience without catering to likes and dislikes.
Not let children have food or beverages (except for water) between meal and snack times.
Let children grow up to get bodies that are right for them.

9. Children’s Eating Jobs
Children will eat.
They will eat the amount they need.
They will learn to eat the food their parents eat.
They will grow predictably.
They will learn to behave well at mealtime.

10. Instituting Division of Responsibility is a Process
Step One – the Parent
Examine the feeding problem: When did it start? What is contributing to the problem?
Correcting the error will allow trust in the child to eat appropriately.
What caused the eating problem?
Misinterpretation of normal growth
Restrained/forced feeding
Poor eating competence growing out of errors in feeding
Stress

11. Step Two – the Parent Get structure in place
Let go of being controlling with feeding
Adjust expectations of children’s eating
Being Considerate without Catering
Include protein, fat, and carbohydrates
Pair familiar food with unfamiliar food
Let everyone pick and choose from what is on the table

12. Step Three – the Child Behaviors will get extreme before they moderate
Rules will be tested at first
Ultimately they will become relaxed and comfortable with eating
Tips to expand your menus
Include foods you like
Add an item without taking something else away
Make only one change at a time

13. Mastering Meals
How to Have Pleasant Mealtimes

14. Get the Meal Habit Set regular family meal and snack times
Use snacks to support meals
Gather the family to sit at the table for meals and snacks
Let everyone decide what and how much they will eat from what is provided
Make mealtimes pleasant by engaging in enjoyable conversation

15. Add New Menu Items Offer new foods while keeping favorites available
Don’t offer substitutes

16. Planning Include protein, fat, and carbohydrates
Always offer something that everyone will eat
Do not restrict “forbidden” food (low nutrient density)

17. Joyful Eating Avoid Virtue – Low fat, sugar, salt, etc.
Keep mealtime pleasurable and it will be sustainable
Involve the family in planning, shopping, and cooking
Relax and enjoy pleasant mealtimes

18. How to Feed Children
Child Feeding Ages and Stages

19. Birth to ~ 6 Months
Feed when she wants to eat – when she’s wide awake and still calm
Sit still during feeding
Let her eat at her pace
Don’t try to continue feeding after she signals that she’s done

20. 6 to ~ 9 Months
Wait to start solids until he can sit up and be able to swallow food from a spoon
Let him eat at his pace
Do not try to force feed after he signals that he’s done eating

21. 9 Months to ~ 1 Year
Offer safe soft foods that are easy to chew and swallow
Let her eat at her own pace
Don’t try to continue feeding when she’s signaled that she’s had enough
Offer breastmilk or formula in a cup
Give her about a tablespoon of each food

22. 1 to ~ 3 Years Have 3 set meal times per day
Offer sit down snacks every 2 – 3 hours between meals
Let him eat at his own pace
Do not try to make him continue to eat or finish his plate if he’s done eating
No eating other than at set meal times and snack times, except for water

23. 3 to ~ 9 Years
Have 3 family set meal times per day and sit-down snack times
No in-between meal/snack grazing, except for water
Let her serve herself and eat at her own pace
Let her have another serving (except dessert), even if she hasn’t finished other items

24. 9 to ~ 12 Years Provide 3 set family meal times
Snack only after school and at the table
No in-between meal/snack grazing, except for water
No munching in front of the TV or while doing homework
Let him serve himself and eat at his own pace
Let him have another serving (except dessert), even if he hasn’t finished other foods
Teach him snack planning combining protein, fat, and carbohydrates

25. 12 to ~ 18 Years
Teach her meal planning principles combining protein, fat, and carbohydrates
Expect her to manager her schedule including taking responsibility for eating 3 meals per day, having snacks when needed, and being hungry at dinner time
Snack only right after school and at the table
No munching in front of the TV or while doing homework
Let her choose her own snacks

26. Your advice has worked wonderfully
Your advice has worked wonderfully! The little lady who would only eat Cheerios & bread is now eager to eat all kinds of baby food, cereal and finger food. It's amazing. There is so much more time to play now, she seems happier and I'm definitely more relaxed. Meals are fun now and there's lots of smiling. Thank you, thank you. I'd call it total success! ~ Amy
Testimonial

27. Satter, Ellyn. 2016. Divisions of Responsibility
Satter, Ellyn Divisions of Responsibility. Retrieved from
Satter, Ellyn How to Feed Children. Retrieved from
Satter, Ellyn Master Meals Step by Step. Retrieved from
Satter, Ellyn Satter Eating Competence Model. Retrieved from
Satter, Ellyn Secrets of feeding a healthy family: How to eat, how to raise good eaters, how to cook. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press.
References