To wonder why so many children go without breakfast

[Sunnydays999]

Iv seen these adverts Kellogs are doing - it made me wonder why the situations so bad ?
Now I totally get some children won't eat breakfast - totally different .but not to be able to afford it on a regular basis ? Breakfast has to be the cheapest meal of the day. Not the best but value bread for toast is penny's ?
If parents can't afford breakfast what's happening with tea

At the risk of being smug weegie ; my dc leave at 7:45 and always have something cooked - bacon/sausage sarnie , eggs, sardines on toast, porridge

The eggs/bacon don't really take much longer than tea and toast.

I hate, hate, hate boxed cereals. V poor nutritionally and ridiculously expensive for the "nice" ones. Am really quite cross about all the years i fell for the con

Every SATs week I run a breakfast club every morning for the year sixes. This year I spoke to a couple of parents of kids I know never have breakfast, and it was sorted that I'd pick their children up early and they'd come and "help me set up." And of course get a nice big breakfast themselves. No, of course it didn't solve the problem long term but they enjoyed it and I'm certain it helped them during their SATs.

1 in 7 is only 4 and a bit per class. I can easily believe that based on the school where i work - especially among older children where not having breakfast is almost something to brag about

Our school ran SATs breakfast club - free for all. Ds was desperate to go with his friends but the result was he had a far inferior breakfast to usual that week. If schools are going to do this they need to provide a good breakfast, not cereals and toast, or they're teaching dc (and parents) that's what breakfast should be.

We provided brioche, grapefruit, toast and tea, which might not be as nutritionally wonderful as some breakfasts, but IMO a more important outcome was that the children had a chance to sit and chat and calm down before the tests, instead of coming in worrying and having to instantly sit down and perform. And for the children who don't get fed in the morning it was a great start to the day.

Where I work (infants) 1 in 7 would be about right (if not generous). These tend to be children from chaotic households where the carers find it difficult/impossible to be sufficiently organised to feed and wash their children or get their children to school on time. I rarely getting the impression that money is the issue as the same children might talk about the take away they had for dinner last night, but poor money management might have been a factor or lack of food in the house because no-one had been organised enough to actually go shopping.

I'm a bit upset with some of the attitudes around families receiving free school meals on this thread

Being in receipt of FSM does not automatically mean feckless parents who do not prioritise their children eating

I've been in receipt of FSM for the last term as I got made redundant, I have a mortgage which I get no help for, I had a car loan to pay which I took out when I was working and it was perfectly affordable -I've now sold the car, phone and broadband contracts that I'm tied into etc

I'm devastated by the drop in my children's standard of living, they are generally fed but I'd be lying if I said they never missed a meal or had some weird concoction made out if things out of the back of the cupboard, but the reality is I miss an awful lot more meals than they do

The school holidays have been particularly difficult with having to find extra food -but it's not because I don't care or can't budget, it's because my expenses far outweigh my income and I don't drink, smoke or go out socially

I've never been that bothered about it, neither is DD. We eat it if we have very physical things to do later that morning but that's it.

DS on the other hand, he eats enough for all 3 of us.

No ones said that all parents are like that.

We are well aware for some that circumstances like yours exist and people are just doing their best.

And no ones saying that the children shouldn't be in receipt of the free meals.

We are asking, just how helpful long term it is, for those children of parents who do fall in the "can't be arsed" or "school are sorting it, 60 b&h please" catergory.

Because those children will be worse off than they were before if the services were cut, they move onto a school that doesn't provide it and the parents are not used to actually having to feed the children.

one of my children won't eat breakfast. He has the same parents and was brought up the same as the other two so I don't know why. He never has eaten it, preferring to eat something mid-morning instead. He is always, always offered breakfast (and by that I mean he is given a bowl of cereal or whatever the others are having and then thrown away - terrible waste but my conscience won't allow me to not give him anything at all).

So...if he goes into school and at 9:30am tells the teacher he's hungry (which he probably is) and she says 'did you not have any breakfast?' and he says 'no' (which would be the truth), is she then going to assume I'm a neglectful parent? If she asked him every day for several weeks, she would get the same response. Would she think to ask him 'so you didn't eat breakfast but did someone offer you breakfast and you refused to eat it?'

I think we have to be very, very careful about making assumptions about what may or may not happen in any given household and the reasons a child may not be eating breakfast. I don't disagree that children go without because of sheer neglect, but it can be far more complex than that.

'Free food' isn't really a new thing either. Infant children receive free fruit/veg at school already. And infants children who are on means tested FSM (free school meals) are also entitled to free milk. Although if they've arrived at school having not eaten they still have to struggle through for an hour or so. At about 10am (snack time) my class sit down to a story, fruit/veg snack and milk.

This still doesn't help older children or fussy eaters as we can't force them to eat/drink!

My DD never goes to school without breakfast, but I'd never judge anyone else on why their children don't unless I know the full story - and unless you live with these 'chaotic families' you don't.

There are too many reasons why people don't or can't provide breakfast - and I don't believe it's just because parents can't be arsed.

Don't get me wrong, I know it does happen, but I don't think it's the majority.

I'm sad to admit I never got fed properly, smelled often, was ostracised by my peers at school - all due to neglectful parenting, but it wasn't willful neglect. My mum had mental health issues, suffered domestic/emotional abuse, drank too much, smoked too much, ate too much... she just couldn't cope. She frittered any money she had on things we didn't need, but that she thought we would want or like to make up for her shortcomings, but she couldn't get the basics right.

Take a family in a similar situation today with additional pressures e.g. low income/benefits, high unemployment, social exclusion etc and add in a punitive sanctions regime, zero hours contracts, massive child care costs, bedroom tax and so on and so on and see how you go.

Not a religious person, but the phrase there but for the grace of God go I comes to mind.

fedupbutfine - I would not make assumptions if someone in my class told me they have not had breakfast (although if they were regularly hungry I may speak to their carer to gauge what was happening). However, if the same child is late for school everyday despite living round the corner, is wearing dirty clothes and has the same dirt marks on the face and hands for days, I would begin to have concerns. This is not an uncommon profile in some schools, for some children. Although it raises concerns, it would not be enough to trigger SS involvement.

It is not linked to poverty IME - the same children may have takeaway's most nights, chain smoking parents who are glued to their iphones, multiple exotic pets or small packs of dogs, or parent's who regularly play online bingo. I have other children who receive FSM whose parents bring them to school on time, clean and fed and who are heard to read every night.

IMO there is a small minority of parents who are unable to put their children's needs before their own.

Typical breakfast for the secondary kids I teach is nothing, or a packet of crisps/packet of biscuits on the way to school, washed down with fake Red Bull.

We use the Kellogg's scheme because it allows us to offer cereal as well as the tea and toast we have always provided. Some take us up on it. A lot choose to wait til break, have a bacon butty and then not bother with dinner.

I don't see how anyone couldn't afford something for breakfast, kids need to eat in the morning its the most important meal of the day and without it they won't concentrate enough at school.
DS1 takes about 30 minutes to eat his breakfast weather its porridge/cereal/pancakes/fruit he just cannot eat early in the morning before school I'm lucky if he'll manage one pancake so I always make sure he has a smoothie and a yogurt/piece of fruit on the way to school.
Now its the holidays I've been giving him breakfast at about 9 and he's eaten it all, some children just can't eat first thing in the morning.

There is a lot less sugar in a can of Red Bull 11g per 100g than in a lot of cereals. Kellogg's Frosties 37g per 100g

only read the first page and already its about benefits and poverty my parents had full time well paid jobs could afford foreign holidays two cars new windows etc i still had no breakfast half the time because i was busy looking after my mom and sister who were too lazy to chop the wood cook the food feed the dogs do the ironing and my dad worked nights so he was asleep i never had the time nothing to do with finances

Deakymom I don't think many people have made it about benefits and poverty. A lot of people like myself have put it down to parental laziness / having priorities in the wrong order. It is laziness why I think breakfast clubs are not the answer; if a parent can't be arsed to get up and make breakfast then they also can't be arsed to get the kid to school early enough to participate in breakfast club. I think giving out free toast and fruit at break time would be more effective because the kids of parents who have trouble getting out of bed will be more likely to have arrived by break time.
I also don't link poverty with benefits as very many people in poverty are in employment. People in poverty whether working or not are not necessarily feckless parents, laziness and poverty are not the same thing.

The nursery I worked at offered breakfast every day, milk and toast for the older children, weetabix for the younger. It was optional, the early starters didn't have to have anything at all, they could just sit and play quietly. Many parents would not give their children breakfast at home because it was offered free at nursery. I live in a fairly affluent area btw.
Slightly different I know but of my 3 only my eldest doesn't 'do' breakfast. He sets off for school at 7.15 and just doesn't want to eat at that time so after about 18 months of nagging and arguing I finally saw the light and sent him with a breakfast bar and fruit. Not ideal by any means I know but at least he actually eats something (he does eat it as well, a relative of mine sees him most mornings ). Interestingly I spoke to his form tutor not long after he started to do it and she said he was much brighter and more with it during form time, something which surprised him when he realised.

I have a teen and he is the same iv , now given up and just shove crisps cerial bars at him least he's eating - although at primary school he ate his breakfast what ever it was had to be eaten b4 tv even if just a yogurt

There is a big difference between children who won't eat in the mornings and parents that can't be arsed to feed their kids!

Until there is a system to sort out sheep from goats, saints from sinners and the feckless from those whose children won't eat breakfast, we'll just have to manage the best we can.
Breakfast clubs, fruit, milk and free school meals. And as the governments flit between funding them and not funding them, I'm pleased that kellogs are filling a hungry tummy or two.
It might not be organically-sources wholegrains with unicorn milk served in a hand-whittled dish of sustainable hardwood. But it's food for the hungry.
Better than sod all. Or me buying the makings of jam sandwiches for the multitude.

I can see how it happens as I have to be in work at 630 and I often don't finish till 11 and I'm bloody shattered. It's just chaotic and if I'm honest I don't think a child will starve if they don't have a bowl of cereal for breakfast, if the rest of their diet is healthy.

I stopped eating breakfast aged 15 when my mum finally stopped nagging me about it. I stopped nagging DS aged 15 least year. Neither of us has any appetite first thing.