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Do you take your children to the grocery store? Do you teach them how to shop or keep them busy with cookies, balloons, iPods, or other distractions. Here are a few ways to get your kids involved at the grocery store.
1. Let them have a say in what the family eats. Then help them find the ingredients in the store.
2. Let younger kids hold your shopping list. Let them cross off the item. Even younger children who are learning their ABC’s can do this. Ask them to cross off the word that starts with “O” instead of “oranges”.
3. Let them fill up the produce bags. My 2yo can do this from the comfort of his seat in the cart and thinks he’s such a big guy for helping.
4. Talk about the importance of eating a variety of colors. We should try to eat a rainbow of colors in our fruits/veggies (try to get in all the colors over the course of a week). Also, the deeper the color, the more vitamins and minerals. Think iceberg lettuce vs romaine or white potatoes vs sweet potatoes.
5. Let them have fun watching the lobster tank, checking out the fish eyes on the fish in the seafood counter, sample the meat and cheese from the deli.
6. Talk about the difference between whole grain bread and white bread. If they are old enough not to squish the bread let them hold the two types and see which one is heavier.
7. Let older kids cut out your coupons, hold them, and match them to the items you are buying.
8. Start a new tradition of picking out a new piece of produce or something from the international asile. Take it home and find a way to use it.
9. For older children and teens, talk about reading labels and comparison shopping (even if you don’t always do it, give them the tools to make informed decisions).
10. If you have friend or family member with a food allergy, talk about it, and try to find items that the friend/family member could eat. Explain what would happen if that friend ate something they were allergic to.
11. For older teens, let them plan an entire meal, shop for (including coupons to help them learn how to use them), and cook the meal. Start with once a month and then make it a weekly task. Someone else should do the dishes!
12. Who am I kidding, sometimes they just need that cookie. Go ahead, let them have one!
Great ideas! I have a 4 1/2 yr old and an almost 2 yr old. Thankfully, I have an awesome hubby that goes with me when I coupon to help keep them occupied. 🙂
Love this! My girls lost my list half way through shopping last visit and I teased them by saying someone else would find it and buy our groceries.
Great tips! I do a lot of these things. Something else that’s worked well for me is thinking out loud about what to buy; it keeps my son engaged in shopping, and it’s gradually teaching him some principles of frugality, nutrition, and how to choose good produce. He also likes to push the cart!
Going shopping is one of the fun activities my toddler and I look forward to. We point things out to each other and I spend a fair amount of time explaining things to her. She already knows what coupons are! I can’t wait until she’s older so I can really teach her how to get the most bang for her buck at the stores.
Great tips! Thankfully, my children are almost always pretty well behaved in a grocery store. It’s when I haul them to multiple stores in one day that they start getting antsy.
These are good tips! I will have to keep them in mind for when my daughter is older. 🙂
Great list! It’s good to keep them as busy as possible.
I used a bunch of these when the kids were at home. Breakfast cereal choices was their traditional pick. I even sent the teenagers to the store without me a few times, yikes! It paid off though. All of them are now frugal, knowledgeable grocery shoppers.
I think these are good tips – I think letting them be involved and have fun is important!
Love these tips, i used to love helping out with cooking and shopping when I was a kid. And hope to involve DS once he is old enough – right now if I let him hold my grocery list… he would eat it!
:o)
This is a great list. I love giving each kid an item that is their’s to look for. It helps them stay involved so I never had problems with my kids and shopping
GREAT TIPS! Will share….
Great tips! Thanks for sharing!