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Healthy food and vitamins for children: support growth and health
During the first 18 years of our lives, we go from baby to adolescent. When you think about it, it's incredible how fast and powerful this process is. Physically, mentally and emotionally, we grow from needy newborn to an independent and self-sufficient person. It's also not surprising that this intense phase of growth and development requires a significant amount of energy, and essential micronutrients.
Our children's physical growth is an important and sensitive parameter of their overall health and even mental well-being. There's a reason we keep very close track of how much our children weigh and how tall they are from the moment they're born. This growth is occasionally rapid in “growth spurts. Sometimes it seems to slow down again, but monitoring it is so incredibly important.
Providing maximum support for this growth in children is also necessary. Fortunately, there are lots of ways to help them do this. From science, we can offer a lot of practical and concrete tips.
The basics: healthy diet and exercise
Whether we're talking about adults or children, the basic premise within Insentials' scientific philosophy remains the same. Healthy nutrition and adequate exercise are necessary to positively influence growth and health. They always form the basis.
Exercise for children: some tips
Play outside, romp, swim, jump rope, play hide-and-seek, tag, go to the youth movement or sports club, go running, build camps ... There are so many ways for children to have fun in an active way. Plus, regular exercise helps build strong bones and muscles, and promotes a healthy weight. In addition, several past studies already showed that physical activity has a positive impact on brain development in children (Meijer et al., 2020) (1). These findings underscore the importance of physical activity in children. But how do you get started as a parent to get your child to exercise more?
- Make it fun! Make it a game, use props or organize a competition, so children don't realize you're just trying to make them exercise.
- Be a role model. If your child notices that you enjoy exercise, he or she will be more inclined to do the same.
- Create a routine. Schedule regular set times for physical activities. Consider a bike ride on Sunday or a walk after dinner. Provide variety and give your children a taste of different sports and forms of exercise. That way, they can discover what they like best and are much more likely to stick with it.
- Use technology such as apps or video games, which encourage physical activity. Our children's screen time can add up quickly. This way, you make exercise approachable and integrate it into their daily routine in a playful way. This makes them more active without it feeling like an obligation.
- Last but not least, exercise in every season! Sometimes it seems like you can only play outside in summer when the sun is shining. Screen usage on gray, cold or rainy days is remarkably higher. Yet there are just as many opportunities during these days. After all, our children are less exposed to sunlight then, which makes the need for vitamin D higher. Put on those rain boots and a raincoat and head out to play!
Healthy nutrition for children makes them grow
To be able to move, it's also important that you offer the right nutrition to your children. Nutrition provides instant energy to their body cells and enables our children to jump, run, swim, bike and play soccer. However, it also affects their ability to think, solve problems, write, read, and so on.
A healthy and varied menu is therefore crucial for the growth, development and (school) performance of our children (Florence et al., 2008) (2). The question remains: What does 'healthy and varied' mean?
You can find a lot of information online about what exactly constitutes healthy eating, but let's be honest: it doesn't have to be too complicated. With a few simple and concrete tips, you can quickly turn theory into practice and start creating healthy habits that really work.
Tip 1: Use a weekly menu
“What are we eating today?” is undoubtedly the most frequently asked question in every family. It can be quite stressful to come up with a surprising dish every day that everyone in the family likes. Your child may be a difficult eater and very picky. Because of this, you often fall back on a routine weekly menu. However, it doesn't take more than 10 minutes to write down a weekly plan and come up with a suitable dish for each day. That way you can also make a shopping list and only have to go to the store once.
Tip 2: Don't be too strict and celebrate every success
An important lesson is not to be too strict with yourself and your children. Eating healthy doesn't mean you can never have a treat. It's about looking at the big picture, not pigeonholing foods as “healthy” and “unhealthy". Too many restrictions and rules create the opposite effect in many cases. By making sure there are always plenty of healthy options, you can help your child take responsibility for healthy food choices on their own. The golden rule is that you as a parent choose what's for dinner and when meals are eaten. Your child can then choose what and how much of it to eat.
It's also necessary to be patient. You don't create a healthy diet overnight. Besides, that will only create resistance and also has less chance of success. So it's best to take it one step at a time. Don't fill your children's plate with unfamiliar vegetables, but let them taste them first. Do they eat sandwiches with chocolate spread every morning? Then try offering something different one day a week, such as oatmeal with chocolate chips. Or whole grain sandwiches with flat cheese and jam or fruit.
Tip 3: Eat together at set times
Sometimes it seems like children are hungry all day long. That probably means they are going through a growth spurt and really need that extra energy. Still, it's important to always aim for a fixed structure: three main meals and two or three snacks, spread nicely throughout the day.
In particular, taking breakfast is crucial. Research shows that taking breakfast has a significant impact on children's performance. Moreover, the higher the quality of your breakfast, the better your performance will be. (Martin et al., 2024)
Tip 4: Turn their plate into a coloring book
A very simple rule to put healthy eating theory into practice is to make sure your kid's plate is filled with as many colors as possible. No doubt you've heard the phrase “eat all the colors of the rainbow” before. After all, by bringing a lot of color into your dish, you're providing a lot of variety. Moreover, this way the dish will look even more appealing to your child.
The color of your food says a lot about the nutrients it contains. If you put a lot of different colors on your plate every day, then you will also naturally eat more fruits and vegetables. Each type of fruit and vegetable, with its own typical color, has its own vitamins and minerals and thus its own health benefits.
Red: lycopene
Lycopene is a strong carotenoid. You can find it in red fruits and vegetables such as tomatoes, peppers, chili peppers and watermelon. Lycopene has powerful antioxidant properties, providing protection to our healthy cells and tissue. It also helps maintain beautiful skin and good cardiovascular health.
Orange and yellow: beta-carotene and vitamin C
Carrots, mangoes, peppers, kiwis and citrus fruits are packed with beta-carotene and vitamin C. Beta-carotene is a provitamin A, which means it can be converted in the body into vitamin A. This vitamin contributes to good vision and proper immune system function. Vitamin A is also important for maintaining healthy skin.
Vitamin C also gives our body protection from oxidative stress as an antioxidant. It also contributes to the reduction of fatigue and normal immune system function. By the way, did you know that vitamin C also increases iron absorption?
Blue and purple: anthocyanins
Anthocyanins belong to the flavonoids, a large family of polyphenols. Well-known food sources include blueberries, raspberries, grapes, red cabbage and eggplants. Anthocyanins also have antioxidant activity where they protect our cells and tissue from free radical damage.
Green: chlorophyll and vitamin K
Green vegetables such as spinach, kale, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, parsley and arugula are packed with chlorophyll and vitamin K. Chlorophyll is the green dye found in plants that they use to capture light. But it also provides many important health benefits for humans because it contains many vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Finally, vitamin K contributes to good bone health, essential for growing children.
An overview
Do you still need an overview of how best to fill your child's plate with nutritious ingredients? Then the image below can help.
It's best to start by filling half the plate with vegetables. These form the base of your meal. Next, fill a quarter of your plate with protein-rich foods such as meat, fish, eggs, legumes or tofu. Choose lean, and unprocessed products. Finally, supplement with potatoes or (whole grain) grain products such as pasta, rice or quinoa. The fats in your meal should preferably come from vegetable sources, such as olive oil or avocado.
Important vitamins for kids
Because children are in the midst of growth and development, their needs differ from those of adults. Consider vitamin K which contributes to good bone health, iodine which contributes to healthy growth and normal cognitive function in children. But at the top of the list is the need for adequate vitamin D. Among other things, this vitamin plays a central role in the absorption of calcium and phosphate in our intestines and healthy bone metabolism, especially during growth. In addition, vitamin D also plays an important role in the regulation of the immune system. (4) This is also why it's recommended that young children be given extra vitamin D from birth.
Vitamin D for children: growth and immunity
If we ask ourselves which vitamins are crucial for young children in full growth, vitamin D is undoubtedly at the top of the list. Vitamin D plays a central role in the absorption of calcium and phosphate in our intestines and healthy bone metabolism, especially during growth.
In addition, vitamin D also plays an important role in the regulation of the immune system (5).
However, from recent research (6) on Belgian children between 0 and 18 years of age, we find that less than 1 in 3 of these children has sufficient vitamin D. More than 40% of these children experience a marked deficiency or even a severe deficiency.
These figures emphasize the need for clear guidelines to improve vitamin D absorption and production. The literature (7) discusses three preventive actions that help prevent vitamin D deficiency:
- diet enriched in vitamin D
- exposure to sunlight
- vitamin D supplementation
Foods fortified with vitamin D
Vitamin D is actually a collective name for Vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol) and vitamin D2 (ergocalciferol). Both forms occur in nature: vitamin D2 comes from plants (e.g. mushrooms), while vitamin D3 is found in animal sources (eggs, oily fish, liver, butter, dairy products, etc.). However, the amount of vitamin D in natural food sources is low and the contribution of vitamin D from food is small or even negligible. (8)
Sunlight exposure
The main source of vitamin D comes from the conversion of provitamin D to vitamin D. This occurs in the skin under the influence of sunlight (UVB rays). The strength of these UVB rays depends on the season as well as the geographical latitude. For example, there is higher radiation in areas closer to the equator. The synthesis of provitamin D cannot even be detected above 50◦ geographical latitude from October to March (9). Hence, people in countries such as Belgium (Brussels is at 51° N latitude) are at risk of low vitamin D levels, especially in winter. (10)
Vitamin D supplementation
The contribution of vitamin D from food is thus rather small or even negligible (Wacker & Holick, 2013b) (11). Moreover, the formation of vitamin D from sunlight is optimal only during a short period of the year (Van de Walle et al., 2024c) (12). For these reasons, vitamin D supplementation acquires an important role.
In Belgium, it's already well-established advice that vitamin D supplementation is necessary up to 6 years of age. However, if we look at the problem of vitamin D deficiency in our Belgian children, we note that this deficiency is present within all age groups. Nevertheless, the problem is greatest in the population of adolescents, this from 7 years of age. The phenomenon occurs in many European countries (13)(14)(15). In fact, from the age of 7 years there is a doubling of the number of children with (severe) vitamin D deficiency, which means that vitamin D supplementation is of great importance even after the age of 6 years. The Higher Health Council also believes in this recommendation and recommends additional supplementation of vitamin D up to the age of 18 (Dietary Recommendations For Belgium - 2016, s.d.) (16)
Multivitamin for Children: Smart Kids
It's Insentials' philosophy that by adopting a healthy lifestyle, one can prevent many lifestyle-related ailments. This preventive mindset is also central to Lifestyle Medicine. From this vision, Insentials already developed the Smart Vitamins for women and later the vitamins for men. These supplements contain all the vitamins for women and men that they need on a daily basis, in a high dose.
Now there are also the Insentials Smart Kids. With this, Insentials developed one pill that contains all the vitamins that meet the daily needs of a child. This in a high dose.
In addition to vitamin D, the Smart Kids also fills other important needs. For example, this supplement also contains vitamins C, vitamin K, vitamin B12, zinc and iodine. In this way, this multivitamin for kids supports bone health, immunity, cognitive function and provides more energy.
In short, the Smart Vitamins for kids contains all the vitamins for growing children from the age of 3.
Why dextrose as an ingredient?
The Smart Kids contains a low dose of dextrose or sugar. This gives a nice taste to the supplement, but also provides instant energy to cells because it's converted into glucose in our body.
The body can store a small supply of glucose in the liver and muscles. It's then no longer called glucose, but glycogen. This supply can come in handy when you need energy quickly, such as during a major exercise. However, young children do not yet have this ability to store glycogen. This comes only from puberty onward. So this small dose of dextrose can come in handy to provide instant energy.
This also means that no artificial sweeteners were added. There's an important reason for this. Artificial sweeteners are sometimes used because they give a sweet taste to food or drinks, but provide little or no calories and have no impact on our blood sugar levels. However, for many of these sweeteners, an “Acceptable Daily Intake” or ADI has been determined. This is an estimate of the amount of a substance that can be consumed daily without significant health risk. However, because children are smaller and lighter, they will reach this ADI threshold more easily. Therefore, it's advisable to limit the use of these artificial sweeteners in children.
- Meijer, A., Königs, M., Vermeulen, G. T., Visscher, C., Bosker, R. J., Hartman, E., & Oosterlaan, J. (2020). The effects of physical activity on brain structure and neurophysiological functioning in children: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 45, 100828. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2020.100828
- Florence, M. D., Asbridge, M., & Veugelers, P. J. (2008). Diet Quality and Academic Performance*. Journal Of School Health, 78(4), 209–215. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1746-1561.2008.00288.x
- Martin, A. J., Bostwick, K. C., Burns, E. C., Munro-Smith, V., George, T., Kennett, R., & Pearson, J. (2024). A healthy breakfast each and every day is important for students’ motivation and achievement. Journal Of School Psychology, 104, 101298. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsp.2024.101298
- Antonucci, R., Locci, C., Clemente, M., Chicconi, E. & Antonucci, L. (2018). Vitamin D deficiency in childhood: old lessons and current challenges. Journal of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism, 31(3), 247-260. https://doi.org/10.1515/jpem-2017-0391
- Antonucci, R., Locci, C., Clemente, M., Chicconi, E. & Antonucci, L. (2018). Vitamin D deficiency in childhood: old lessons and current challenges. Journal of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism, 31(3), 247-260. https://doi.org/10.1515/jpem-2017-0391
- Van de Walle, L., Vandenplas, Y., Toelen, J., & Raaijmakers, A. (2024). Vitamin D Status in Belgian Children: A Regional Study. Nutrients, 16(5), 657. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu16050657
- Antonucci, R., Locci, C., Clemente, M., Chicconi, E. & Antonucci, L. (2018). Vitamin D deficiency in childhood: old lessons and current challenges. Journal of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism, 31(3), 247-260. https://doi.org/10.1515/jpem-2017-0391
- Wacker, M., & Holick, M. (2013). Vitamin D — Effects on Skeletal and Extraskeletal Health and the Need for Supplementation. Nutrients, 5(1), 111–148. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu5010111
- Landgrebe, A. V., Lund, M. A. V., Lausten-Thomsen, U., Frithioff-Bøjsøe, C., Fonvig, C. E., Plesner, J. L., Holm, L. A., Jespersen, T., Hansen, T., & Holm, J. C. (2021). Population-based pediatric reference values for serum parathyroid hormone, vitamin D, calcium, and phosphate in Danish/North-European white children and adolescents. Clinica Chimica Acta, 523, 483–490. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cca.2021.10.024
- Van de Walle, L., Vandenplas, Y., Toelen, J., & Raaijmakers, A. (2024). Vitamin D Status in Belgian Children: A Regional Study. Nutrients, 16(5), 657. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu16050657
- Wacker, M., & Holick, M. (2013). Vitamin D — Effects on Skeletal and Extraskeletal Health and the Need for Supplementation. Nutrients, 5(1), 111–148. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu5010111
- Van de Walle, L., Vandenplas, Y., Toelen, J., & Raaijmakers, A. (2024). Vitamin D Status in Belgian Children: A Regional Study. Nutrients, 16(5), 657. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu16050657
- Landgrebe, A. V., Lund, M. A. V., Lausten-Thomsen, U., Frithioff-Bøjsøe, C., Fonvig, C. E., Plesner, J. L., Holm, L. A., Jespersen, T., Hansen, T., & Holm, J. C. (2021b). Population-based pediatric reference values for serum parathyroid hormone, vitamin D, calcium, and phosphate in Danish/North-European white children and adolescents. Clinica Chimica Acta, 523, 483–490. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cca.2021.10.024
- Rabenberg, M., Scheidt-Nave, C., Busch, M. A., Thamm, M., Rieckmann, N., Durazo-Arvizu, R. A., Dowling, K. G., Škrabáková, Z., Cashman, K. D., Sempos, C. T., & Mensink, G. B. M. (2018). Implications of standardization of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D data for the evaluation of vitamin D status in Germany, including a temporal analysis. BMC Public Health, 18(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5769-y
- Vierucci, F., Del Pistoia, M., Fanos, M., Erba, P., & Saggese, G. (2014). Prevalence of hypovitaminosis D and predictors of vitamin D status in Italian healthy adolescents. ˜The œItalian Journal Of Pediatrics/Italian Journal Of Pediatrics, 40(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/1824-7288-40-54
- Voedingsaanbevelingen voor België - 2016. (z.d.). Hoge Gezondheidsraad. https://www.hgr-css.be/nl/advies/9285/voedingsaanbevelingen-voor-belgie-2016