Lunchbox Police and unsalted/sugared popcorn

[ohmychrist]

Yesterday a small box of homemade popcorn (just corn and olive oil) was taken out of DS's lunchbox.

Surely it's ok though? No salt or sugar.

That's seriously annoying.

We are having trouble with pre school at the moment. They have decided snack must be fruit or veg. I personally think it's ridiculous. As the mum of a skinny and very active 4 year old I think it's up to me to decide what he has.
Don't have this problem with my school age son.

Ridiculous. Nanny state behaviour. Padlock on lunchbox time I think.

twinkletwinkle I'm in Scotland and our DD school does this.

Not only that for playtime snack they check what everyone has and mark the unhealthy ones in a book. If the child has 90% or more healthy snacks for the year then they get to go on a trip at the end of the school year. If you don't then you miss out.

Healthy snacks are - fruit, veg, raisins, cheese, corn based crisps (so quavers/ whatsits/space raiders are fine), cereal bars (rice crispy marshmallow bar is ok), fruit winders or those yoghurt covered raisin things are also deemed as healthy. Oh and not forgetting if it says weight watchers or some other diet food/ low fat brand it's ok - so weight watchers crisps would be fine but a packet of walkers wouldn't.

School lunches are a bit naff. Hotdogs / burgers/ pizza / southern fried chicken burger (as well as things like pies, tuna pasta etc).
They don't do cake and custard any more. It's either sugar free jelly (packed with sweeteners), or fat free , sugar free yoghurt (again full of sweeteners) personally I would rather she got cake and custard to the sugar free - fake food they serve.

Packed lunches get inspected and chocolate / cake or anything else they deem unhealthy or not low fat gets removed. I was seriously annoyed they day she got told her home made savoury cheese muffin was bad for her.

She has also told me she doesn't want to be fat and her tummy looks too big. She is between the 10th and 5th centile for weight and on the. 5 the centile for hight. Her BMI shoes she is just in the healthy weight range (close to the under weight side of the chart). I know she's picked up the fat thing from school as they do teach 'healthy' eating. She has also told me I shouldn't be buying her the blue milk because it's full of fat and I need to get her the green one. Again this pisses me off big time. She's a growing child who is not far from being underweight so as her mother I choose to give her full fat dairy because she needs it. I don't need the school telling her this sort of nonsense or making her feel ike she is fat when she clearly is not.

Sorry went off on a bit of a rant there.

It's getting pathetic this lunchbox police business! Seriously what right do they have to remove perfectly good items from your child's lunchbox?!

Unless a kid is turning up everyday with leftover takeaway, sugary fizzy drinks, heaps of chocolate, crisps, and never anything remotely healthy, they need to back off!! Even then, they should address it with parents and not just launch in and take food away!

Everything in moderation is the answer!

Not only that for playtime snack they check what everyone has and mark the unhealthy ones in a book. If the child has 90% or more healthy snacks for the year then they get to go on a trip at the end of the school year. If you don't then you miss out.

Pumpkin that's a bloody disgrace, are parents actually complying with that?

the lunchbox policing is getting beyond ridiculous.

pumpkin if that was my dd I would be fuming at the school, we have full fat dairy products for dd's as mine are also slim (I don't weigh them except to check for car seats)

at this rate instead of overweight children we are going to end up with a generation of anorexic children afraid to eat anything incase they get fat. my dd also occasionally says 'oh im getting fat' It annoys me as she is far from fat and besides it doesnt matter what u look like as long as u are healthy and happy. not everyone is built to be slim.

This lunchbox stuff is ridiculous! I'm a teacher but no longer live in the UK...thank god! I am a picky eater myself and wouldn't want to be a hypocrite by going around and judging children's lunchboxes. Considering the children don't pack their own lunch anyway, it just seems so silly.

I have a question, if a child gets something confiscated like a penguin for example, do they get it back to take home at the end of the day?

My DDs school is very sensible - the only lunchbox rules are no nuts, no fizzy drinks, no chocolate and no sweets.

I'm happy with that. If you want to feed your child Coke and Mars Bars do it after school, there's hours after they get home to fill them with crap.

(I did have an argument with DD1s old school when she was in Y3 or 4 when they confiscated a few prawn crackers she had taken in, yet let other children eat crisps. I put them straight on that one).

I also have a DD who is 2nd centile for weight. She has always been slight and has to take medication which has an appetite suppressant effect. There is a healthy eating policy in school.

BUT IT IS SENSIBLE!!!!

Nothing is ever confiscated.

The school raise it with parents frequently about having healthy options. I wanted to go to the talk tonight about healthy lunches with a dietician - but DH has to go to the talk at her sportsclub which is mandatory. (I might just bring DD to school and go anyway). They have done the "Food Dudes" programme in Y1 equlivalent, to introduce them to various fruits and veggies.

The idea is to have some fruit or veg, and enough decent food to keep them from being hungry daily. They are allowed have a small treat on Fridays. HM cake is allowed (I get the impression it should be plain, not iced). The afterschool club has hot soup, toast or toasted sandwiches most days when they get in (in school), there is fruit available, and they get a slice of pizza each on Fridays.

DD hates sandwiches that are not "fresh" (made there just before you eat them) - so refuses to eat sandwiches for school lunches. We have tried sooooo many things to get her to eat. Currently, she alternates between a flask of tomato soup (she may drink a cup) or her food flask with some hot chicken, hot pasta, hot potato wedges, or hot leftovers from previous night's dinner. I always have a second tub in her bag with a small tub of raisings and a chocolate covered rice cake - in case she actually feels hungry. I often send in things like tomatoes, carrot sticks, pepper sticks, cheese, pieces of cold meat, snack packs of crackers, small tub of tuna mix....sometimes they're eaten, others ignored. With fruit, its the same - she might eat grapes or a chopped apple, or green banana - or ignore them.

She will eat more at home - mandarins, lots of raw veggies (tomatoes, carrots, peppers, corn etc), a fair amount of cooked veggies (not everything, but mushrooms, peas, carrots, cauliflower in cheese sauce, broad beans etc), and a reasonable amount of dinner usually. Somedays, she will have a couple of spoons of cereal for breakfast - others it will be a full bowl and a muesli bar and fruit; or scrambled eggs with ham, cheese and tomato; or a couple of sausages; or a tuna melt; or have a chunk of cheese to nibble while going to school.

There are some girls in the class (Y3) already talking about being fat and watching what they eat. DD doesn't talk about that at all, and will say she doesn't want meds at weekends "because she is starving and needs to eat loads". Recently I have started giving her 300ml of hot milk going to bed (we have smoothie bottles which are handy for non-spill in bedroom) and that is helping both getting to sleep and with increasing calories.

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I NEED to go to the talk tonight.

Sorry - there is 1 thing banned in DD's school. There are a number of students with nut allergies so all nuts are completely banned for anything to do with school - lunchboxes, PTA monthly coffee mornings, winter and summer fairs, and the 1st communion tea in school hall.

DarlyDixonsDarlin I'm not sure but I imagine a lot are. It will be the child that misses out on the trip if they don't.

nocutsnobuttsnococonuts I know I am fuming. As I said I wouldn't take much for her to be underweight so I want her to have full fat dairy. One of my goals as a parent is to have her growing up loving herself and her body. I hate the fact the school had put this fat idea in her head now and I 'm on damage control.

I have added a photo of DD (school colours greyed out) - why should a child this slim be worried about being too fat? - the shirt is age 3-4 btw.

DD1's new school (first day today so I don't know how strict they really are) asks you not to send popcorn in because of the mess it makes, which is kind of understandable, especially as they eat in classrooms here.

Otherwise it seems pretty sensible.

Her previous school didn't allow yoghurts, but that was a food safety issue I think (relatively hot country, no fridges available, potentially horrible yoghurts by lunch time) as well as mess.

Pumpkinette That's a disgrace. I'd be checking that with the council because last I heard schools weren't allowed to dictate what children had, they could only ask. When we lived in Scotland a few years ago the Head had a massive problem because a little girl had a severe nut allergy. Ambulance called, staff giving her her pen on the floor in front of her 5 year old classmates - the works. Turned out the problem on that day was a certain type chicken crisps. Something to do with the oil. Anyway, the Head (naturally) banned them. One parent took exception and discovered that the Head cannot actually ban anything. They can ask parents to follow rules and guidelines, but do not actually have the authority to stop you sending your child in with a bag of nuts. This particularly horrid mother sent her child with a packet of those crisps on a regular basis. Classes had to be rejigged to keep her child away from the allergic one (her mother stated it was her "right" to eat the crisps she liked). I'd be amazed if they were allowed to discriminate for a trip on that basis.

I don't have a problem with rules about crisps, biscuits, sweets etc. In a country suffering an obesity crisis I think it's a good thing. I'm just unsure as to whether the popcorn was fattening or unhealthy in another way.

It is scary how behind the times some of the guidance is.

More and more now nutritionists are saying that there is nothing wrong with full fat foods, i.e. cheese and blue milk.

It's sugar that is the big problem when it comes to obesity.

I'm also not a big fan of sugar free alternatives or WW stuff either.

My DS was told off for having a piece of home made chocolate cake in his lunch. It had lots of hidden veg in it which he told the dinner lady so she went away.
His sister has school meals at the same school. That day she had chocolate brownie for pudding.
If my son is told off again for what's in his lunch I will be going in to see the head. My children are just the right weight-almost underweight.
I will feed them what I like.
And I am a teacher.

I can't stick the lunchbox police, and I am relieved that I no longer have primary school aged children. Secondary school does have some rules (such as no nuts and generally healthy), but is much less "in your face" with it, and I guess with so many students things are much harder to police there too. Suits me.

I have a tall and slender 16 year old daughter who does a lot of sport. She does eat a fair number of high fat and high energy foods with her packed lunch, but she does need those to keep her going. She does have fruit such as grapes with it, and the bread is often brown, multi-seed or granary with ham, tuna, cheese or cream cheese fillings. If our previous evening's meal was pasta or rice with some leftover then she also gets a pot of that to take in. To that she will also add a chocolate biscuit (club biscuit etc.) and a packet of crisps. Still she gets hungry, so has been known to buy another wrap or pasta pot of some sort from the canteen. I know that at primary school I would probably have been laid into for some of that.

I also have a 12 year old who is shaping up to be similar, though she prefers a canteen meal with her friends, and the food is pretty good there too.

Sod the lunchbox police.

When I started school in the 90's there was "lunch box police", they made sure packed lunch contained the correct items and were eaten in a certain order. I only attended the school for reception and can still remember the dinner ladies going "sandwiches, crisps, biscuit, fruit or yoghurt" that's what I had everyday the entire time I was at school! Can't imagine being told to put biscuits and crisps in these days. I didn't grow up obese (the opposite in fact). Can't see anything wrong with popcorn!
At my next school nobody gave a fuck about the contents of the packed lunches, I had friends who had fizzy drinks daily . I do think a general no fizzy drinks or sweets rule is fine but some schools go way over the top!

Hate the phrase lunchbox police

The school policy may well unreasonable but my children and my friends children schools do not have such rigid rules

No full size chocolate bars or things containing nuts are all I've ever heard of

I hate the phrase too, but reading examples like stealing plain popcorn it seems pretty appropriate really. Or, perhaps, lunchbox gestapo might.

Demand an explanation - there's no excuse for such foolishness.

Am dreading this sort of officiousness when dd starts school. Thank goodness she will be on school dinners as lunchbox police would be more than I could cope with.

What you say about excluding children from school trips is horrendous, Pumpkin. Punishing a child for the contents of a lunchbox that they didn't even put together themself. And of course it will be the child with the cheap crisps in their lunchbox who misses out, not the child with the organic carrot sticks and hummus. That says a lot.

I'd love mine to be able to go school dinners. However the one issue I have with the girls' school is the fact that they have a clear your plate policy.

So no biscuits in your packed lunch, but eat every single thing no matter how full you feel at dinners.

Bizarre.

DS's school has a relatively strict packed lunch box policy, but the school lunches aren't very healthy at all. It's baffling .

How do they enforce that LaLyra? It's a bonkers policy anyway but how do they get them to clear their plates?

I know DD would sit there all day before she ate something she didn't like.