Halloween can be a very exciting and challenging time for parents. As we all know, children get very excited about dressing up in their favourite character and going door-to-door saying “trick or treat.” As it turns out, it really isn’t “trick OR treat”. It seems the treats accumulate in the kids bags whereas the trick is really for the parents, who now have to figure out how to help their children negotiate their way through all their treats!
Halloween certainly is a very fun experience for children. Dressing up and collecting containers/bags filled with candy, what could be more thrilling? However, we must also acknowledge the global epidemic of childhood obesity and overeating. Many people will simply suggest making an exception for Halloween as it is one day a year, but the many treats collected on Halloween can last days to weeks or even months, much longer than the intended exception. That being said, how often are exceptions made? Birthday parties, other holidays, snacks after hockey or dance or even school; the list most definitely goes on and on. It is critical that we help children learn how to eat their treats in moderation as this is a good lesson for any day of the year and not just for exceptions!
Here are some tips to help limit your child’s candy consumption this Halloween:
- Discuss the number of treats they can have when they get home or in general at any one time. Set limits on when they are allowed to have a treat (ie not before a meal).
- Encourage them to use their Halloween candies to “trade-up” for something they have been wanting (ie a book, toy, game).
- Allow them to select their favourite candy or a certain portion of what they collected and use the rest to distribute to trick-or-treaters for the rest of the night.
- Allow them to select their favourite candy or a certain portion of what they collected and put the rest in a jar for mom/dad to take to work to share with their coworkers.
- If you have more than one child, have them take turns either trick-or-treating for candy or a charity (ie UNICEF which distributes donation boxes) and then have them split the candy they collected as a team at the end. They will not only have fun trick-or-treating, but they will learn the importance of philanthropy.
We hope this info has been helpful and we would be happy to hear from you if you’ve tried any of these tips. Please feel free to share any others you may have!
If you live in Toronto and would like nutrition support for your child, feel free to learn more about the Kindercare Pediatric’s clinical nutrition programs.
My mom always said I could eat candy on Halloween, and then I should put the rest by my bed for the Halloween Fairy to take to kids who were too sick to go trick or treating.
One year, when *I* was too sick to go out, candy “magically” appeared. Made all those years of limited candy completely worth it.
I’m thinking I’m going to do this with my kid, too.
A lovely story and a fantastic idea! Thanks for sharing…
DF
We trade some of the candies at the dentist. They offer toothpaste, toothbrush and cash!
Last year, my friend’s mom had a great idea. When her 3yo grandson came home, she held out two bowls, a large one and a small one. She passed the small one to him first and said, put all your favourite candies in here. Because the bowl was small, he made a small selection. The rest of the candy went into the big bowl. The small bowl remained the one he enjoyed candy from for the following days. Probably wouldn’t work on older children, but great for little ones.
Here are some more ideas that our family used back in the day:
Because there is “so much”, encourage your children to play with the “wealth”.
1. Each child could sort their own haul, making de-facto bar graphs by type of candy
2. Sort by colors*
3. “Let’s have a tasting flight!” — cut up or otherwise dismember the treats, and allow tastings and discuss what you like and don’t like.
4. Talk about “who likes what and why”. Jane doesn’t like candies with nuts; Jim prefers dark chocolates over all other candies; Julio likes chewy candies like gummy bears and worms and so on; Janet likes intense flavors like sour balls more than chocolate; Jamal *loves* sticky caramels but can’t eat them because of braces, etc.
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*back in the day my daughter spent more time playing with Skittles (those little, colored fruity candies) than she did eating them. Sometimes she’d save up a week’s worth of Skittle treats (3 packets) in order to really have a lot.