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

I'm not hungry until 11 ish and I
Nor is my dh . My dd is the same .no point in eating if you're not hungry .

bish & Witch - there's a difference between not being hungry and not having breakfast - presumably if your child asked for some breakfast you would provide something?

The sad fact is that almost all parents do care and are doing their best. Some, usually because if their own shocking upbringing, just don't know how. They know how to make breakfast but they don't know how to live a life that's unchaotic to make it happen regularly. Many actually believe they are good parents because they are doing a much better job than their own parents. Parenting classes may help some of them but they genuinely can't see that they need them

Yes of course there is breakfast available Rag

I think a lot of people don't understand that children can't concentrate in school if they haven't had breakfast.

I was never a breakfast person myself, but it was the meal I was most concerned about getting into my daughter, because teacher friends had mentioned how difficult it is to teach children who haven't had breakfast.

Mine are fine.

They do have a late-ish supper though so they have never complained of feeling hungry and believe me they would let me know! Sometimes DS has a banana.

Our circumstances are rubbish but no one is making me feel like a terrible mother for not shoving cereal down my kids throat at 5 in the morning!

Lots of people don't eat breakfast, that's really not the point. If your child is offered breakfast/ is able to take something to eat out of the cupboard but isn't hungry fine.

For some children they don't have a choice of breakfast, there is nothing for them to eat and they are hungry

I've had to call parents in the past and ask them to bring in some food for their child, because they've said they haven't had any breakfast and are hungry.

Can you imagine receiving that phone call, you would die of embarrassment right? Wrong! Just pissed off that you have inconvenienced them.

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

I know where you are coming from, but it's the same argument that is used to stop food being improved in hospitals and why carb-heavy cheap food is the stuff of school dinners.

If our authorities, with their bulk-buying power, can't offer reasonable quality food and set a good example, who can? Kelloggs cereals are unbelievably sugary, if you eat those and some nice fish and chips followed by a super sugary huge cookie/bun/cake, which is what's on offer in my children's schools, then you have a perfect recipe for childhood obesity.

It's pointless to hand-wring about the obesity epidemic when you are in the thrall to the large food manufacturers- all of the government's healthy food initiatives involve processed crappy food (swap butter for lovely low fat margarine, why not swap your usual fizzy drinks for no-calorie ones) and this is just more advertising of the same.

I wouldn't have Tesco/supermarket vouchers in school, no Kelloggs cereals, no vending machines, no nothing. I don't believe in any of this and I can't believe schools are allowed to push this rubbish, especially the Sports Programmes where you have to spend £100's just to get a hoop for sports day. It's all the same, but this is worse as it prods the guilty conscience as there are children going hungry in the morning (which isn't solved by giving them their daily amount of sugar all in one sitting).

That goes for all of the time though, not just in the morning.

Some reasons may be related to poverty but I suspect many more are related to a combination of shift work, awkward kids in the morning and general life.

If someone asked me 'is giving your children breakfast important to you' my honest answer would be no. Their diet is very important to me as a whole but I certainly don't feel I have to put cereal or toast in front of them in order for them to be healthy and happy.

As with most things it depends on circumstances. Emphasising constantly that everyone needs breakfast and that it's essential is wrong and misleading. Some people do I suppose but some people also prefer a hot meal at midday and a snack style tea - what fits best into your life and mouth!

We have three meals of lunch, tea and supper - that suits is better than breakfast lunch and dinner. Missing breakfast doesn't mean my kids have "hungry tummies" -
I had to ask one teacher nicely to stop feeding dd at break time as she was gaining weight and couldn't work out why!

Duck my dd would do that! The teacher would ask if everybody had eaten a good breakfast and dd would say no! The teacher used to give her cereal bars and other snacks during the day ignoring the healthy lunch box she had.

Dd gained four pounds in a month and I really couldn't fathom why. I found out by mistake and had to ask the teacher to stop!

Well, I suppose in the long run it doesn't really matter much, the truly desperate will be picked up by SS and the rest will manage.
Or not, but people will raise their children however they choose to in a free society. Schools can't fix everything, especially without funding, no matter how many new initiatives there are.

Myrandom It can be difficult trying to work out whether a child is really hungry/ not had breakfast vs just trying to wrangle an extra snack!

There are all sorts of reasons why a child may not be having breakfast (my post sounded a bit judgemental, but I had a particular child in mind!)

In our school we would always speak to the parent and offer support via the PSA. I find it very odd that a teacher was giving your child food, but never bothered to say anything to you :-/

Anyone thought that maybe the reason we think breakfast is the 'most important meal of the day' maybe be related to the reason why we think we need to drink 8 glasses of water a day - including my favourite 'by the time you feel thirsty it is already too late - you are already dehydrated' (evidence for that one? evolution anyone?)
When in one breath we are told to eat only when we are hungry - and in the next whether we are hungry or not we should eat breakfast ...think about it... (and maybe do a google or two)
Look at the origins of breakfast cereals ...
Apart from a couple of posters this is driving me insane!

Don't worry! She was a newly qualified teacher at the time and clearly meant well but was off the mark with the dd (little scamp!)

I think the families where there are problems with drink and drugs and live chaotic lives are different to families like mine where yes it's chaotic but we mostly muddle along and the kids are fed, clothed and loved into a million pieces. But because I know how much love and care goes into my children's diets I do bristle a bit when no breakfast equates to chaos and drink and drugs - so not true in my case!

I suppose generalisations just aren't that helpful?

I agree unlucky

To put it another way, what my children eat is very important to me but when they eat it is not.

So OP, has your question been answered yet?

myrandomfamily I really fail to understand why you can't provide your children with breakfast. I understand you are busy but can you really not pour some cereal into a bowl, open a yoghurt or peel a banana?

If you get up early you could just set it on the table the night before or make a sandwich up that the kids could get out of the fridge.

I'm sorry but breakfast is not just about the 'healthy eating' side of it or overall nutrition it's about setting your child up so that they are in the best possible place to start their day and can concentrate and work well at school. If they have low blood sugar and a rumbling stomach it is going to affect their work.

I think you need to see what changes you can make to your lifestyle. What are the reasons that you can't provide your children with a simple breakfast each morming?

House box the reasons are:

1. I leave too early. They do not want to get up at 5 and I don't blame them!
2. They don't want it. They could, if they were starving eat a banana but they don't.
3. They already eat 3 meals just at slightly different times of the day. Too much food is obviously not good for them.
4. If it isn't broke ... both children are happy, healthy and thriving, doing very well at school - I genuinely don't see stuffing food they don't want down them at some unearthly time in the morning as top of my priority list as a parent.

Just asked DS and he says breakfast makes him need a poo! Okay then!

Myrandonfamily
If you leave the house at five who is looking after the children, could that person not fix breakfast?
If the children are also leaving very early then they probably need breakfast more than others as they will have a long time between waking and lunch.

As for breakfast making your DS need a poo, that is a good thing because his digestion system has worked overnight and having the extra food in his tummy will help to clear out the digested waste.

He could but as I've said :) they don't want it, they eat three meals and they are totally and completely happy and healthy.

Forcing them to eat isn't conducive to anything

thenapoleanofcrime, I couldn't agree with you more. The breakfast club at my ds's school consists of feeding kids Coco Pops, ffs. I have battled and battled with them about it, but they say that the kids won't eat anything else. I only use it because I have to drop him off there so I can get to work, but I always give him an actual breakfast before we leave because I do not want him eating Coco Pops. For the kids that are there because their families can't afford/won't do breakfast, what kind of message is that sending out? We are taking responsibility for your children's health and we are stepping in to fill the gap that you find difficult to bridge by feeding them a high-sugared foodstuff with no nutritional value because we think that is the best solution to the problems you are facing? It's corporatist bullshit of the worst kind.

I stop work next week so hopefully things should be less chaotic.

But I doubt they will want breakfast to be honest. DH works late so we have supper when kids are in nightwear after bath so we all get a meal together.

Four meals a day plus snacks provided by school would be too much for them.

Myrandomfamily. You know your own children and I'm not criticising, but there are a lot of hours between getting up and lunch and a lot of concentration required in the classroom.

I actually don't feel hungry in the morning, but at around ten, eleven, my concentration goes and, as I am self-employed, that is when I know I have to eat something.