Just to add, a stimulant drug such as caffene can actually calm down a normally hyperactive child (AD/HD), and can be benificial to some extent. And as long as Iced tea, Cola and the like are normal kid drinks I can’t rule out coffee
Unless you are hypervigilant about caffeine in all forms, denying coffee seems silly. Using the numbers from the site above, and assuming standard servings of coffee (6 oz) and soda (12 oz can) the two aren’t much different.
My oldest (now 14) used to, as a toddler, sneak the last, cold sips from my mug. She doesn’t care for the taste anymore.
We have been known to offer our 8yo hot, black coffee when she is feeling congested. She likes the taste and it seems to help.
From my Scandinavian mother I learned the custom of allowing children a (special treat) cup of coffee on their “name days”-which definitely points to an adults-only mindset, but an understanding that a cup now and again won’t hurt you.
My kids steal my coffee all the time and have since they were 12 or so. I finally stated making them their own fresh ground cup-a-Joe. They take it like daddy with some half and half and 1 tsp sugar+ 1 packet of Equal. The family that gets wired together, stays together… until someone gets distracted by a shiny object.
My 13 year old son wears a size 11 shoe and is on the way to 6’3" or 6’4" and my 16 year daughter is 5’11" so stunted growth is not a concern.
5’9" female here, drinking coffee since age 10-11. Don’t think it stunted my growth. I was weened onto it though, taking it with a lot of milk and sugar.
You were weened after the age of ten? :eek:
6 oz. is a tease, not a serving! 
When I was a wee lass (about 4, I guess), I wanted to drink coffee because daddy drank coffee. He started giving me a “cup of coffee” which consisted of about 4 oz. of milk, 3 tsp. of sugar, and a splash of coffee. The beginnings of a caffeine jones, for sure! However, now, being a 5’8" female, I can’t say it’s stunted my growth. On my current carb-restricted weight-loss plan, I tried giving up caffeine for two weeks to see if it would speed my weight-loss, but it didn’t, so I’m still downing my pot of coffee each day. Also, my urologist says that drinking coffee or tea helps with my kidney stone situation. In fact, in the magazine supplement that comes with the Sunday paper, I was reading a little article on caffeine. This particular article says that people who drink at least 2 cups of coffee a day get 50% fewer kidney and gall stones than people who don’t drink coffee. Of course, I’ve had so many kidney stones that I shudder to think how many I would have had if I wasn’t a coffee drinker!
The only times I’ve curbed my coffee consumption was during pregnancy: with my first one, I lost the taste for coffee before I even knew I was pregnant! With my next two, I limited myself to one cup of caffeinated coffee and one caffeine-containing soda a day. My 16-yr-old likes coffee, my 12-yr-old hates it, and my 3 yr-old likes to tease me by stealing drinks of it out of my cup. But as long as they don’t seem to have any ill effects from it, I wouldn’t stop them from drinking it.
My son has been drinking coffee since he was a tot. He is now five. (And, despite being Korean, is tall for his age on the caucasian growth charts)
Heavily diluted with milk and a little sugar. So maybe an ounce of coffee.
Grandma (my mother) got him hooked. Which surprises me. My husband was born in Holland to beatnik parents, so I’d expect HIS mother to be the one getting my kids hooked - as I understand he drank coffee as a child (with milk) as is the custom.
My daughter doesn’t really like it. She likes cocoa. She isn’t a pop drinker either - she likes lemonade.
In general, we all watch out caffeine intake in the house. No one drinks more than one cup of coffee - and I mix my beans to be half decaf. We tend to go for no caffeine pop (which my kids seldom drink pop - and almost never drink caffeinated pop).
(But then, when I was about five, my grandfather used to mix us up Grasshoppers at Christmas time. Not a lot of liquor - and a lot of ice cream - but still…none of us seem to have turned into lushes).
I started drinking coffee when I was about nine. But it was heavily sugared & creamed. I think if you give a kid coffee black they’d probably think it was gross after the first sip and wouldn’t want it anyway.
Dangerosa, how do you make a grasshopper? I’ve heard they’re good, but haven’t tried one.
I’m a coffee junkie, but my son’s never shown any interest in drinking it. I’d probably mix him a weak cup if he asked, though. If we stop at a coffeeshop he gets an italian soda or cocoa.
I started drinking it in my late teens, precisely because I wanted to establish how adult I was. It was quite the bonding thing for me to casually ask Dad to pass the pot over.
I caught myself looking askance at a girlfriend who allowed her daughter to order coffee at a restaurant when our kids were around 8. Somehow just seeing this little person blithely turn to the waitress and ask for coffee, especially as the Mom in question didn’t drink it herself, was weird. AFAIK, the child’s continued growing just fine, and doesn’t seem to have developed any addiction so far.
I taught a workshop at a Girl Scout camp this morning, and I did a double take at all the 12-year-olds lined up with their mugs at the coffee urns. The times, they are a changin’…
According to my bar book:
Grasshopper:
1 oz creme de menthe
1 oz white creme de cacoa
1 oz light cream
But my grandfather, I think, just made them with vanilla ice creme and creme de menthe. He’d also make Pink Ladies for us with ice cream and gin and grenidine. And I was drinking my Chanti with 7up before jr. high.
My Grandma always gave us kids heavily diluted coffee, when we sat at table with the grown-ups. It was a special treat for us.
I have seen many a parent order, or let their kids order, large Frappuccinos without blinking an eye. Even at ten-thirty on a school night. Go figure.
Do you think perhaps it has something to do with the wide variety of flavored coffees available that makes it fun for kids to drink? Or do the kids these days who drink coffee prefer regular plain Columbian coffee without the fancy schmancy flavors?
My favorite is the Vanilla Macadamia Nut flavor. Smells great while it’s brewing, too. Mmmmmm.
I’ll make a cup for my 14 year old son on the weekend. He considers it a treat.
My 11-year-old daughter will ask for a cup, but not drink it. So I told her I wouldn’t make it for her anymore. She likes fruit flavored teas better anyway (no caffeine.)
I started drinking coffee when I was about fourteen, mostly to prove how mature I was. Now I’m not too keen on hot drinks, so I tend to drink iced coffee. Or espresso ice cream…
Working in a mall with both a Starbucks, a Starbucks kiosk on the lower level AND a Starbucks in the Barnes and Noble, I’ve seen many the youngster aged 14 and under toting giant cups of coffee or frozen coffee confections. I can’t stand coffee m’self and wonder how these kids do it. Don’t parents understand what they are DOING to their kids, making them bloody caffeine junkies?
MetalMaven
Well, unless you’ve poured the coffee yourself…
We will let my five year old tote around a cup from Caribou (we prefer their coffee to Starbucks), wil cocoa in it. Hot chocolate does have caffeine, but not to the extent that coffee does. On occation, he will even get a small decaf mocha. My daughter is partial (at just turned four) to carrying around her coffee cup with steamed milk with a shot of raspberry syrup.
Don’t assume that just because they are carrying a cup from a coffee shop, mom is treating them to a triple shot espresso. Even that triple espresso can be made decaf.
And coffee is, even with the caffeine, not nearly as bad for you as Mountain Dew - which many late elementary and jr. high kids guzzle. Mountain Dew has most of the caffeine (especially if you put milk in your coffee), plus three times the sugar and the carbonation. I (who feed my kids coffee and grew up drinking from as early as I can remember) am always a little shocked to see big restaurant glasses of Mountain Dew set in front of six year olds.
Oh, don’t get me started on Mountain Dew. Can’t drink that stuff. Had it once many years ago at a picnic. Had to go pee every five or ten minutes for hours after that.
The only reason I drank it that time was the store was out of 7Up or Sprite, so my friend suggested Mountain Dew as an alternative. I had no idea it would affect my body that way.
Boggles my mind when I see other people drink it without any problem.