How to Practice Oral Hygiene with Your Children
October 1, 2009
Oral hygiene is very important and should be introduced to a child at an early age. Sometimes however children do not pick up this habit which results in poor dental care and oral hygiene. The reason this happens is because they have not been educated enough as to what poor dental care leads to. It is therefore important that the benefits of good dental hygiene be explained to them and they are encouraged to take proper care of their teeth. Many schools have started educating children on the benefits of proper tooth care by using both audio and visual aids.
New tooth brushes are purchased for the kids which encourages them to brush their teeth. The different parts of the mouth are explained to them and the different types of teeth that are present in the mouth. With the help of a mouth model they are shown how they should go about brushing their teeth and then encouraged to do the same. There are a few things that one can do to help educate kids on the benefits of proper dental which would encourage them to take care of their teeth.
If your kids skip brushing their teeth you need to educate them on what the repercussions could be. Yelling at them and screaming is not going to help solve anything and they might not brush their teeth just to rebel against you. What you can do is demonstrate what would happen if they didn’t take care of their teeth. You could buy some educational videos which would help to educate them on proper dental care. Another method which has helped get kids to run to the washbasin and brush their teeth is by demonstrating what tooth decay does. You can do this at home with the help of 2 apples. Take one of the apples and with the help of a tooth pick or a fork make holes in the apple and leave it. Let the other apple be the way it is. In a day or two you will notice that the apple that has the holes in gets rotten and brown. Encourage your child to observe what has happened and have a discussion with them as to what caused this to happen.
With kids it is also important to introduce the concept of flossing to help boost dental care. A lesson on flossing would also help them perform this important activity. While practicing use a mouth model and a piece of string. Encourage kids to use the mouth model to practice and check to see if they are holding the string in the correct manner while cleaning between the teeth. This would ensure that they hold the floss correctly when they are cleaning their own teeth. If a mouth model is not available them you could do this with your hands. Use your fingers to represent the teeth. Hold your fingers up while your kid practices flossing your fingers with the string.
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