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What's Going On In There? How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life
- By Lise Eliot, Ph.D

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Top Brain Foods for Your Child

By Andrew Loh

Eating a healthy and nutritious meal or breakfast will provide your child all the essential nutrients he or she needs to drive the small body through the long school week, stay alert, and get ready to study hard and involve in a number of extracurricular activities. Experts have been telling you all through these years that a sumptuous breakfast is a very good idea for your growing child.

Tip: The complete nourishment and energy pool provided by breakfast will step up the metabolism rate as well as enhance a number essential body functions. Experts also warn that skipping breakfast regularly will hinder and spoil academic achievements and interfere with learning abilities.

The food or diet that you provide your child must contain a number of ingredients and additives that promote growth and improve memory, assist body in convert the nutrients into fat, protein and essential carbohydrates. Here are some specific food and food items that can provide all the required nutrients required for optimal brain development:

1. Choline: This is perhaps one of the most critical parameter of your child's diet. Without proper amounts of Choline, you simply cannot expect your child to enhance his or her memory required so much for ensuring success in the school. You can find choline in eggs and different types dry nuts.

Ideas:

• Prepare a breakfast menu that contains scrambled or boiled eggs along with a number of fresh vegetables. You can serve the egg along with two or three slices of whole grain wheat toast.

• High fiber whole wheat is quite good for better and optimal bone growth.

2. Useful anti-oxidants: A number of different vitamins like Vitamin A, C and E act as natural anti-oxidants that are required for preventing build-up of dangerous free radicals in the body. Free radicals in the body can lead to premature ageing and sagging skin.

Ideas:

• Include ample amounts of fresh and green vegetables as well as a number of fresh fruits as items of menu.

• Nuts, beans and legumes are quite rich in anti-oxidants, while citrus fruits contain large amounts of Vitamin C that is helpful in providing your child's body a very good source of energy and anti-oxidants.

3. Omega-3 fatty acids: To help memory and cognitive functions, you can think of including foods that are rich in Omega-3 fatty acids. A number of cold water sea fishes like tuna, salmon, cod and perches contain natural Omega-3 oils that are very rich in highly unsaturated fatty acids. Avocado, Olive oils and Flax seeds also contain a large amount of Omega-3 fatty acids.

Ideas:

• Split avocado fruits and grilled salmon provide lots of Omega-3 oils and including these items in your child's meal will help improve memory functions.

• Flaxseeds can help improve digestion and aid in better absorption of essential ingredients. You can just sprinkle a spoon or two of ground flaxseed power into breakfast cereal or mix it into a Yogurt-fruit mix.

4. Whole grains and pulses: Very complex whole grains contain lot of useful carbohydrates, rich folates and plentiful of Vitamin B complex. These essential dietary nutrients can provide a steady stream of energy, rich dietary fiber for smooth passage of food in the gut as well as help enhance better memory and cognitive abilities.

Ideas:

• Oatmeal is perhaps one of the best known breakfast cereals. Oatmeal contains plenty of fiber, high quality protein and carbohydrates and number of useful vitamins and minerals.

• Wholegrain cereals containing bakery products are good for your child's body as they contain high complex carbohydrates that provide a huge amount of readily available energy.

5. Iron and Zinc for enhancing mental alertness: Iron and zinc rich food items are essential in your child's daily diet because of their essential and mandatory nature in providing blood hemoglobin enhancing abilities as well as optimizing nutrient absorption into the blood stream. Lean meat, poultry, spinach, green beans, dried fruits and whole grains are very rich in iron and zinc minerals.

Ideas:

• A spaghetti mealtime mixed with lean meat will ensure better absorption of iron and zinc.

• Dry cherries, raisin, walnuts, almonds and pecans will also provide plenty of iron and zinc.

• Whole wheat pasta is also a nice idea and this has the ability to step up increased production of red blood corpuscles.

6. Calcium and Sodium: Calcium and Sodium are two of the most critical nutrients that are so much required for normal growth of bones and cartilages. Your child's diet must contain at least 1300 mg of calcium to help synthesis of bone marrow as well as primary cartilages.

Ideas:

• Low fat milk, soy extracts and cheese contain plenty of calcium and sodium.

• Almonds, salmon and fortified cereals also provide you a rich source of dietary calcium.

• Cheddar or Swiss cheese and light meat turkey can form a part of your child's lunch.

Your child's meal plan is a critical exercise as every child will have a definite like or dislike for a particular food item. Providing variety in the meals and snacks will urge and cajole your child eat more and grow in an all round manner.

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