Promoting good health and nutrition is of utmost important when working with children of any age. I work with infants and toddlers who typically are just beginning to eat table food and milk, so it’s my job to make sure that they are given fair opportunities to try the foods. Often times when they first start to try to eat it takes them a long time or they refuse or gag because of textures and tastes, so it’s important for me to be patient with them and try to encourage them to eat good foods. It’s also not a rare occurrence that a child in my care only wants to eat his/her fruits. This is a fine thing to have happen for a time until they begin to not be picky, but it’s important for my team and I to not offer the child only fruits. They need to be given a fair chance to try every food available to them and if they choose not to eat it, then at least they were given the opportunity. Some children will also tend overeat at this age; if food is put in front of them, they eat it because they don’t understand that it’s important to cut themselves off after they have had enough. I need to make sure that they are getting enough food, but not too much even if it seems like they will eat more. There are a number of components that go into promoting good health and nutrition and I have a big responsibility in ensuring each child in my care is being taken care of.
Preventing the spread of illness is a difficult job especially when one child has already gotten sick. First off, before anything else happens, if a child in my care is found to be ill, I need to take immediate action and notify the parents. Said child needs to not have any interaction with other children and any toy he/she plays with needs to be cleaned and disinfected as soon as possible. The next step in preventing the spread of illness would be to notify all parents of any sickness that is going around not only the room, but the center itself. Heightening awareness is crucial because parents will then be on the lookout and their guard will be raised. All toys and objects need to be thoroughly cleaned and sanitized after every use and at the end of every night as well as any clothing, bedding, or bibs that were exposed need