Young children are very innocent. They do not know a lot about the world around them or how they are supposed to act in the world around them. They are born with no knowledge and because of this it puts a great responsibility on the parent to teach them things they need to know. One of these things is brushing their teeth. If left to themselves children would not know that they should brush their teeth and their teeth would probably go bad. Here are some tips to teaching your children how to effectively brush their teeth:

The age you should start teaching your children to brush their teeth:

The period from three years of age to seven years of age is the age when you should teach your children to brush their teeth. Their teeth should be kept clean all before this time, but once they hit three they should start learning to do it on their own. Three is a good age to start because three years old is when all the baby teeth should be grown in. Once they have a full set of teeth it is important to teach them to keep those teeth strong. Baby teeth serve an important function in helping to shape the face and prepare for permanent teeth to grow in. You do not want the children to do anything that would prevent these things from happening how they are supposed to. Children will probably have caught on how to take care of teeth and not let them go bad by the time they are seven.

Developing important skills to help them in their teeth brushing:

In order for children to brush effectively and get their teeth very clean they will have had to have developed hand coordination. At three this will probably not be fully developed yet. Until they develop the coordination to hold the tooth brush by themselves and brush effectively you should do the brushing for them. Every now and then you should give them the opportunity to try so they can start getting the hang of it. As their hand coordination develops you will be able to tell that they can handle the toothbrush better. As it develops to become easier and easier for them to handle it you will need to help them less and less. By the time they are seven they should be able to handle it very well.

Important things to teach them and to look for when they brush:

It is very important to teach children to brush thoroughly. You need to be sure that they reach all areas of their mouths. Young children will get into the habit of brushing very lightly over their teeth and forgetting to reach all areas of the mouth. A lot of times they will not brush far enough to the back of their teeth. They need to learn to brush their top teeth, their bottom teeth, their front teeth and their back teeth. They also need to learn to brush all around their teeth, not just the tops of their teeth. The most important place for them to brush is down next to their gums. Next to the gums is where they will have the most plaque build-up and the most food get caught. They need to brush hard and close to the gums so that they can clean all this stuff out. Otherwise they will develop cavities. Lastly, make sure that they do not swallow the toothpaste and also be sure to always checks for spots on their teeth that could turn into cavities.