Family-style meals encourage children to serve themselves. In addition to being nourished by food, infants and young children are helped through the act of feeding to establish warm human relationships. Eating should be an enjoyable experience at the facility and at home. Measure compliance by structured observation. Children shall be actively involved in serving food and other mealtime activities, such as setting and cleaning the table.
Children develop new motor skills and practice increases their dexterity.
See comment on standard NU33. Children shall be offered familiar foods that are typical of the children's culture and shall also be introduced to unfamiliar foods. By learning about new food, children increase their knowledge of the world around them and increase the likelihood that they will choose a more varied, better balanced diet in later life. Eating habits and attitudes about food formed in the early years may well last a lifetime. Children and staff shall wash their hands as specified in on p.72.