Teaching kids about oral hygiene can be difficult with willful children. To some parents, it may even seem like it isn’t important if the children still have their baby teeth, but that’s the time that children learn how to properly care for their adult teeth. Try these tricks to keep your kids interested in a healthy smile.

Make It Fun

Trying to force kids to brush for a certain amount of time can seem like a drag if you’re just staring at a time while your child shrieks like a wild pterodactyl. Try putting on a song or short video that your child likes as an alternative to a classic sand timer. For small children who need help, you can sing to them with “aahs,” “oohs,” and “ees” to get them to mimic the appropriate face shapes and sing along.

Give Them Options

Kids are perhaps the most opinionated humans on the planet. Giving them options creates a sense of excitement. Let them choose their new toothbrush each time you need to get a new one. They may pick one with lights, their favorite character, or just their favorite color. While you may have picked similarly for them, they are usually happier choosing for themselves. Having two different kinds of toothpaste also helps. Each time they brush, they are able to choose between the flavors, colors, or characters which gives them a small step to look forward too. This similarly works with different colored flossers.

Visit A Dentist

This may not sound fun, but if you find a good pediatric or family-friendly dentist, the children will get to learn about how they are doing and why oral hygiene is important. While you may be teaching them, pediatric dental care services verify they are healthy and you can catch things most parents can’t know are wrong by simply looking at their kids. The younger they get used to a dentist the less scary it becomes.

Make It A Family Activity

Brushing together as a family makes it so that kids can see that it’s not just something that they have to do. Showing that it’s something that the adults do just as much as they do solidifies the importance of the activity to a child. In addition to the psychological effects, it also teaches children the proper techniques to brush their teeth. They watch you and learn to brush in a similar manner through observation.

Keeping healthy teeth is a lifelong commitment, but shouldn’t feel like a chore. Make oral hygiene a priority early on so your children always have the bright smile they deserve.