How nannies can support families to plan healthy, balanced meals

Both nannies and parents want children to be happy and healthy. Most of us understand that nutrition and what we eat plays a crucial role in this.

However, feeding a family can be a difficult undertaking. Many parents are battling with time pressures, the rising cost of living and their own energy levels.

Employing a nanny can be a wonderful support in ensuring that healthy meals are put on the table every week. Sometimes though, lack of inspiration, picky eating or having allergies to deal with mean that it can be challenging to plan weekly menus.

It might be that making the grocery list, doing the grocery shopping or planning the menu is part of your role as a nanny or parents may ask for your input, ideas or support. Here we take a look at what should feature on a family’s weekly grocery list.

Plan healthy and balance Meals

What is healthy eating?

The definition of ‘healthy eating’ is continually evolving in response to new research, as is what is considered to be a healthy diet or healthy eating.

One definition suggests that healthy eating is simply “eating a wide variety of foods in the right proportions, and consuming the right amount of food and drink to achieve and maintain a healthy body weight” but we should also consider that “healthy eating” is about more than just what we eat because how we eat is important too.

Humans naturally have a close relationship with food, not only is it our source of nutrition and therefore vital to life, but it is also part of most societies’ cultural identity and rituals.

Having a good relationship with food is to do with how and why you choose the foods you eat much more than what those foods are.

If you feel any type of shame, guilt, stress, or fear regarding the foods you eat, you may have an unhealthy relationship with food.

As nannies, it is often part of our job to help children to develop a healthy relationship with food.

What is healthy eating for children?

Plan healthy and balance Meals

When we think about healthy eating it’s important to remember that nutritional needs will vary from person to person, and babies, toddlers and children have different nutritional needs to adults.

There are some similarities between the nutritional needs of adults and children as all humans need vitamins, minerals, proteins, carbohydrates and fat. However, these are needed in different amounts depending on age.

Younger children require fewer calories overall. For example, a 1-year-old child should consume about 900 calories per day, but a 14- to 18-year-old needs 1,800 to 2,200 calories, depending on activity level and gender.

Children need to get these calories from a variety of foods too; a child aged 2 to 3 years should get 30 to 35 percent of his calories from fat but by the time we reach adulthood we should only get 5 to 6 percent of our calories from fat.

What are the benefits of healthy eating?

Plan healthy and balance Meals

The WHO states that “Unhealthy diet and lack of physical activity are leading global risks to health” Whilst “a healthy diet helps to protect against malnutrition in all its forms, as well as non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including diabetes, heart disease, stroke and cancer.”

Basically, healthy eating is important because it helps to maintain good physical health, which prevents costs to health services.

Eating a healthy, balanced diet and staying active can also help us to maintain a healthy weight, which in turn helps to prevent health issues!

Deficiencies in some key nutrients can weaken parts of the immune system, making it much easier for us to get ill, so healthy eating helps us to get all the nutrients we need for the immune system to function normally.

Healthy eating helps humans to feel physically and mentally well, and to perform well at school, work and contribute to our communities.

For young children, all of these are benefits in the long term, but in the short term too healthy eating can help small children to grow. Since the early years of childhood are a period of rapid growth this is especially important.

Meal planning

Meal Planning

Meal planning can help to save time, money and disagreements about what to have for dinner, and it is a task that nannies are often assigned and it doesn’t need to be boring, strict or limiting.

Some families really struggle to cook from scratch every night because modern life is extremely busy with after-school activities and homework to complete too, so sometimes we do need shortcuts.

However, we can help to balance those nights where we need to cook a quick, but less nutritious meal with cooking a bigger batch on the days we do cook from scratch and saving a portion to put in the freezer.

This way, when families have a busy night, they can simply pull a healthy meal out of the freezer.

Ingredients to include in a healthy grocery list for families

If you are asked to put together a healthy grocery list for the family you are working for, you should be sure to include foods from the following categories:

Ingredients Plan healthy and balance Meals

Fruits and vegetables

Try to include a portion of veggies or salad as part of the main meals. Fruit can be used as a good alternative to dessert too. Nannies can encourage children to choose fruit or vegetables as a snack by having them prepared and ready to dish out quickly, for example, cucumber and carrot sticks, sliced peppers or prepared mango.

Dairy

Children need to get a bigger proportion of their energy from fats than adults and dairy is a good way for them to achieve this.

Under the age of 2 or 3 children should drink full-fat milk, but semi-skimmed or skimmed are okay once they are older and growing well.

Cheeses and yoghurts are another good way to get more fat into children’s diets along with plenty of calcium, which contributes to strong bones and teeth.

If the children you are caring for don’t tolerate dairy well or their parents choose not to give it, this is not normally a problem, but nannies should seek some advice on how to best ensure that dairy alternatives meet children’s needs.

Carbohydrates

Most western countries suggest basing meals around carbohydrate foods which give us energy, so you should ensure that you keep a stock of rice, pasta or potatoes as the base for meals.

Meat, fish or other protein

Protein foods like meat and fish are important for building muscle, try and choose lower fat cuts where possible as these will be better for the whole family. If the family you work for are vegetarian or vegan you can choose alternative protein sources like pulses, beans or soya and seek out some tasty recipes for these.

Pin Summary

Healthy Living Course. OCN-London and International Nanny Institute

When seeking work as a nanny, being able to provide a healthy, balanced set of meals and snacks is a very desirable skill and many families will include being able to cook nutritional meals as essential criteria for applying to their role.

If you need to learn more about nutrition, healthy eating and a balanced diet, our Healthy Living course can help you with this and ensure that you are a more attractive applicant when applying for new nanny roles.

Sign up today to improve your skills and your confidence in supporting healthy lifestyles for children and their families.

International Nanny Institute

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What makes a ‘Professional Nanny’

Uncovering the Essential Characteristics of a skilled Nanny

Roles vary significantly from country to country and family to family, which makes it difficult to define the role of the professional nanny. As a result of this lack of clarity, many people consider themselves qualified to take on the role of a professional nanny when in reality they are not. Here we look at some of the experiences that do NOT qualify you to be a professional nanny:

Taking care of siblings or babysitting

Taking care of siblings or babysitting for friends or relatives is something that sparks an interest in a career in childcare for many people. Of course this is a good thing and can be a good base to build on but it is not adequate experience from which to take on professional nanny roles.

Often babysitting takes place when children are already in bed sleeping, or it may be a much more short-term arrangement where parents’ expectations are fairly low.

For example, a mother may employ a baby sitter to play with her kids for a few hours while she finishes a work project. Here she would expect the children to be kept safe, but she may be in the house or nearby, and not expect the babysitter to support children’s development, plan activities for them, cook meals or work with them on a long-term basis.

Some of the skills you may develop from this experience are:

  •  Basic childcare skills
  •  Trustworthiness
  •  Responsibility

Some skills you may need to develop further:

  •  More advanced childcare skills
  •  Knowledge of child development
  •  Improved communication with parents/care

Having your own children

Other people draw this idea that you don’t need to be qualified to look after children from the notion that parents are not qualified yet have to look after their own children.

This is a flawed idea on many levels; Firstly because it equates professional childcare with parenting, which is disparaging to both parties, childcare and parenting are distinct roles, and secondly because it seems to suppose that parenting is easy. Ask any parent and they will tell you that having kids can be really hard work.

Having your own children and taking care of them as they grow up, experiencing the highs and lows of parenting is a wonderful experience and there are plenty of skills from this that you can bring to a career as a professional nanny.

Nanny-parent-child relationships take many forms and nannies have been described as mothering-by-proxy, shadow mothers or third parents. (Macdonald, 2011).

However, being a parent does not mean that you are ready to work as a professional nanny as there are several fundamental differences between raising your own children and professionally caring for someone else’s.

Some of the skills you may develop from this experience are:

  •  Patience and resilience
  •  Understanding of family dynamics
  •  Empathy with other parents

Some skills you may need to develop further:

  • Advanced knowledge of child development 
  • Working with families as a professional
  • Communicating with parents

Working in a nursery 

Working in a nursery or preschool environment is often a very demanding role. Expectations are high as you may be caring for many children at once and there are often strict regulations to comply with.

The skills that you learn through nursery work include talking to children’s parents and working in partnership with them to support children’s development. Most nurseries and preschools will also help you to develop your knowledge and understanding of child development and teach you how to plan activities that meet children’s individual needs.

Working in a nursery however does not prepare you completely to work as a professional nanny as working with children and families in their own homes requires a unique and specialised skill-set that is quite different to providing group care in a nursery setting alongside colleagues.

Some of the skills you may develop from this experience are:

  • Planning activities for children based on their age, stage of development, interests and needs.
  • A good working knowledge of child development
  • Communicating well with parents

Some skills you may need to develop further:

  •  Working with children and families in their own homes
  •  Dealing with sibling dynamics and working with multiple ages of children at once
  •  Working with newborns and very young infant

Being a teacher 

Being a teacher demonstrates a good level of education, commitment to children and skills in planning and assessment, all of which can be transferred into a career as a professional nanny.

However, being a teacher in and of itself does not qualify you to start a career as a professional nanny as there are many more skills that you will need.

Some of the skills you may develop from this experience are:

  • Planning educational activities 
  • Making learning fun for children
  • Assessing children’s developmental needs

Some skills you may need to develop further:

  •  Carrying out care routines 
  •  Working in a home-based role
  •  Working with newborns, infants and toddler

Being an Au-pair 

For some nannies, being an au-pair is an excellent stepping stone. Working in an au-pair’s role allows you to gain valuable experience of working with children and engaging in family life.

Although au-pairs live in the family home and work with children in this setting, they are often used for babysitting more than sole-charge care, and may not have responsibility duties  such as designing routines or planning activities that support children’s development.

Some of the skills you may develop from this experience are:

  •  Working with children
  •  Working in a home based role
  •  Carrying out care routines

Some skills you may need to develop further:

  •  Sole charge working
  •  More in-depth knowledge of child development and how to support this
  •  Planning appropriate routines and activities

Teaching language classes 

Teaching a language class is a fantastic way to gain experience working with children. It also helps you build up your knowledge and understanding of how children learn languages.

It’s likely that in teaching a class you have also gained some skills in managing children’s behaviour such as rewarding and promoting positive behaviour and discouraging negative behaviour.

However, teaching a class for a short period of time is totally different to being a sole-charge carer children throughout the day and whilst many of the skills you have developed will be useful and transferable, there are many others that you will still need to develop.

Some of the skills you may develop from this experience are:

  •  Making learning fun
  •  Behaviour management
  •  Supporting children’s language development

Some skills you may need to develop further:

  • Working with children and families in their own homes 
  • A holistic understanding of child development
  • Communication and partnership with parents 

What parents expect from a professional nanny

There are several different kinds of nanny and parents’ needs and expectations will vary from role to role. However, as a general rule, expectations of a professional nanny are pretty high.

When hiring a nanny, parents are entrusting someone else with their children’s safety, emotional wellbeing and development, so it stands to reason that they may have demanding expectations.

A professional nanny will need to be able to plan and arrange safe, fun learning opportunities that suit children’s age and stage of development, and are based around their interests.

In order to do this they will need to be able to observe and assess children’s development in relation to the typical and expected sequence and rate of child development.

Parents will also expect a professional nanny to know how to plan and prepare healthy meals and snacks, carry out age appropriate care routines (such as making up bottle feeds safely, planning weaning, changing nappies, supporting sleep and rest times) and have up-to-date Paediatric first aid training so that they know how to respond and keep children safe in emergency situations.

Professional nannies will also need to show good organisational skills, time management skills and be able to communicate well with both parents/carers and children themselves. Sometimes a professional nanny may need to work in partnership with other agencies

What qualifications should a professional nanny have

Despite legally not requiring any formal qualifications, eighty-two per cent of nannies responding to the SIRC (2009) survey reported having a childcare-related qualification and in interviews and focus groups with nannies it was apparent that nannies viewed qualifications as an important part of their professional identity. Parents too are increasingly looking for nannies with qualifications.

Gaining qualifications in the field of childcare requires study and effort but through this, you are able to gain the knowledge and skills that you need to do your job properly.

Studying how children learn and develop means that you will feel confident to plan activities that will be stimulating to children of different age ranges and will help to support their development across different areas of learning.

Having the skills that you need to keep children safe means that you are able to carry out your role on a day to day basis as well as respond appropriately in an emergency.

Our International Nanny Institute provides practical and comprehensive childcare related courses designed to train and educate nannies, au pairs, babysitters and childminders.

We offer reasonably priced online training, which allows our students to study any time and anywhere.

Our courses are designed by a team of experts including psychologists, nutritionists, teachers, paediatric nurses and SEN specialists who are committed to maintaining high standards and staying up-to-date in the field of childcare.

The International Nanny Institute is passionate about empowering and raising the standards of child carers as professionals in their fields.

If you would like to complete a childcare related qualification, designed especially for nannies with us, browse our course catalogue now.  

International Nanny Institute

Why should I get certified by the International Nanny Institute?

The International Nanny Institute is a leading education centre that provides practical and comprehensive domestic childcare-related courses online. We design our courses to train and educate nannies, au pairs, babysitters and childminders. Maybe you have just discovered us, or maybe you have been considering enrolling in one of our courses for a while and are wondering what the benefits of being certified by the International Nanny Institute are. Well, here we list the reasons why  being certified by us is the right  choice!

Designed with nannies in mind

International Nanny

With an array of different courses available across the internet, it can be difficult to know which to choose. The International Nanny Institute  courses have been written by a team of experts who have worked as nannies themselves, this means that the courses have been designed with nannies in mind and will be well suited to their day-to-day work. Not only are our courses full of academic information from experts in child development, nutrition, paediatrics, SEN and more, but they are also directly applicable to your work as a nanny in a  way that more general childcare courses may not be.

Study online

All International Nanny Institute courses are easily available for study on your home computer, laptop, tablet or smartphone, making it easy for busy professionals to continue their education and study at their own pace. This flexibility allows you to complete your studies during your free time in the evenings, on the weekends or even during your commute. 

Set your own pace

Our courses consist of 4 weekly, in-depth training sessions supplemented with a quiz for checking your understanding. We also offer an interactive group forum so you can discuss what you are learning with other students worldwide. Our forums can help foster understanding, learning and personal development on a deeper level. All of our courses are taught online and take about  60 hours to complete, but students are given an 8-week window for each course, leaving you in control of how and when you study. We don’t set the deadlines, you do!

Stay up to date

International Nanny Agency

We have produced a range of courses covering a wide base of topics, so there’s sure to be something you will find interesting and relevant.  We are passionate about keeping child care providers up to date with important topics and want to help them follow the latest best practice, so we’re always developing new courses in response to current needs. Checking back or subscribing to our email is a good way to ensure that you don’t miss out on new courses that could keep your professional knowledge up to date.

Build your career

The International Nanny Institute is passionate about empowering and raising the standards of domestic child carers as professionals in their fields.  We believe the nanny profession is a meaningful, worthwhile career and want to help nannies to develop and reach their own career goals. To help achieve this aim, we are constantly developing courses and programmes that will help you to take control of your career and meet your personal, professional and academic goals. Our courses also help you to stand out from other applicants, landing you more interviews, more often.

Boost your confidence

When you feel up-to-date with your professional knowledge and skills, and in control of your career journey, you feel more confident. In a profession where you often need to take control and set your own goals, targets and schedules, confidence is key. Studying with the International Nanny Institute can help to raise your confidence allowing you to feel secure when performing your role.

If you think studying with us is right for you, find out more and register for a course or programme today. Come and visit our website at www.international-nanny.institute today! We can’t wait to have you on board!

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