• At a young age, cleaning a child's plate should not be a requirement.  Kids have an amazing ability to listen to their hunger and fullness cues; in fact, much better than adults!  So making a child eat more than he or she wants can lead to unhealthy eating habits later in life.   
• Kids don't dehydrate like adults, so don't encourage sports drinks at a young age.  They are not professional athletes with adult needs.   Stick with water.
• Gaining weight will happen during puberty, so don't give your kids what they want all the time.
• Make them at least try new foods, and if they don't like it, try it again another time. This may not be sports-related, but from the time kids are very young, they know what they can get away with. Allowing them to make all their food choices at a young age is detrimental to their sensory development and their ability to experiment with foods. When they are in high school, they should not still be ordering chicken tenders off the kids menu at a Mexican restaurant!

First in a series of nutrition tips from Allison Maurer, a board certified specialist in sports dietetics and certified strength and conditioning specialist at the University of Tennessee, where she oversees performance nutrition for student-athletes.