To think the school has a point about packed lunches

[Rebeccaslicker]

I'm not sure about banning parents from the premises, but is it a bad thing to say no chocolate, sugary drinks etc in a primary school lunch?? (My DD is only 2, so I haven't had the lunchbox decisions yet, v interested in people's views!)

www.google.co.uk/amp/www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/stoke-on-trent-news/now-mum-48-banned-school-1108690.amp

Hazey we had something similar. The teacher saying to me like i was an unhinged loon 'he eats really well, he eats all his school lunch' with a face of 'you are neurotic'. I said i found that so hard to believe because he had not touched food like that for 2 years and had 3 hr meltdowns if they were on his plate. In the end i had to ask specifically 'did he eat carrot?' No. 'Did he eat potato?' err No. 'Did he eat any meat?' errrrr No, not that i saw... 'Did you see him eat anything other than dry bread?' errrrrr immmm Nooooo, but he ^doeas eat reeallyyy well. Yeah because dry white bread every day is just great.

Banning things is such a blunt tool and it goes against all the professional advice we have had. We are told to give the DC what they will eat, that eating something is better than nothing (so giving an apple instead of chocolate cake is not advised). Not to make food into an issue. To just make sure they are aware of and exposed to other foods and are encouraged in a non pressurised way to try things.

The school's packed lunch policy suggests the inclusion of one portion of fruit; vegetables; a sandwich, rice or pasta; and milk, cheese or yoghurt, as well as a bottle of water each day.

But it says a packed lunch should not include chocolate bars, sweets, sausage rolls, cereal bars, flavoured water and cans of pops.

DS1 would only have dry bread and water then out of that selection.

That is terrible of them hazey hope they apologised for lying to you.

I know DD eats because she tells me herself and I ask her why she won't eat the same meal at home and she says it's different at school. Even when they have food she really really doesn't like (like liver casserole) she tells me she just takes a small portion (they serve themselves from the hot trays) and eats it and then fills up on bread/crispbread.

hazey and mrsk we've had the same here. Dc2 is a wonderful eater, eats everything quickly and eats a variety of food apparently. This is a child who can spend an hour over a bowl of dry cereal. Turns out he eats well because he hardly picks or gets given any food - last week he got one veggie sausage and some peas for example. Or doesn't like it and they give him some buttered white bread which they don't tell me about so we assume he's eating decently. I'd rather send him in those days with a packed lunch rather than him be hungry.

I think packed lunches are a difficult thing for schools to navigate. IMO most schools are trying to do their best for the children, not simply trying to annoy parents for the sake of it. Behaviour is better when children not filled up with sugary drinks and sweets, for instance. Schools do provide cakes and puddings, although they will have limits on how much sugar etc in them- but that does make it more difficult to then ban parents from putting cakes in packed lunches.

My daughter's school made things simple- everyone has school lunch. Snacks are from home but crisps, cakes, chocolates and sweets are banned, as are fizzy drinks. Lunches are cooked on site and uses local produce wherever possible. Including veg grown in the school garden (in season) supplemented by local supplier who uses local growers where possible, eggs from local farm, meat from local butcher and so on. I have sampled the food and it is delicious. They do occasionally have pizza etc but as it is all home made it has significant less sugar/fat/salt than those bought in. It is a private school, so more free to make it's own rules though. The meals are a million miles better than those I got at school. I think quality of ingredients is important and if bought carefully from local suppliers could be done quite economically. Though I suppose schools have enough to be getting on with, without having to negotiate with food suppliers for produce.

DS1 would only have dry bread and water then out of that selection.

Yes, and that's why the lunchbox policy is a suggestion. Those parents who genuinely need to send only the "banned" items (though note the policy says "should not" rather than "must not") would already be in conversation with the school about it, as you were.

Letting everyone send in unlimited chocolate/crisps/Red Bull/Haribo for lunch so that children with genuine food aversions or allergies can have what they need is a bit like letting all children wander in and out of classrooms whenever they feel like so that a child with additional needs can promptly access the sensory tent during a meltdown. Completely disproportionate!

I'm in London Suburban. Our tap water tastes disgusting. I put elderflower cordial in mine.

You can be in conversation with the schools all you like. Ds's school preferred to let him starve than allow me to even send him in with a protein fortified milkshake or flapjack.

I can say, as the parent of grown up DC, that you can give them lentil crisps, homemade cake with no sugar, whatever - but when they are grown up, they will do whatever they want and in their 20s, they believe they are invincible!

We only have fizzy drinks at home on birthdays and Xmas as a treat, or if we went out to a pub (infrequently). I cooked food from scratch, and we rarely eat processed food. As an adult, DS downed bottles of lucozade every day, like it was going out of fashion for 10 years. Its not due to lack of education, because DD2's boyfriend, a doctor is exactly the same! They just don't think anything is going to happen to them!

Checklist - sounds about right. And then when they get to 40 and have a blood test, they might find out they are wrong, as I did 😭

Rebecca DD may be an unusual case, but I've noticed a pattern when she's had D&V and hasn't eaten for a few days, she gets dizzy spells and her eyesight goes funny. Adult DS1, who's diabetic and used to sugar crashes, recommends apple juice as a quickly digested source of sugar. I think some children need more sugar than others. DS2 needs sugar little and often, or he gets hangry.

I absolutely don’t trust the school to teach my dc nutrition when the message most schools are sending out are wrong. The good food and bad food idea for one. There is no such thing as bad food there are just foods you should eat less of than others. And recommending low fat alternatives to normal foods that kind of thing so no I trust them with the reading and writing but I don’t trust them with the nutritional messages they are teaching.

The other issue I have with things like this are that from a dental perspective it is recommended that sugary snacks like a biscuit or squash are restricted to meal times rather than in between so that you aren’t subjecting teeth to an acid attack more than is necessary so if there is a time for a biscuit and squash to be allowed lunch or dinner time are it. My dc have a biscuit or similar in their lunch box along with fresh fruit or veg a sandwich etc. I’d be mighty pissed off if the school started meddling in what I send in. The parents that don’t pack a decent lunch aren’t going to care and the ones that do sensible balanced diets for their children which include the odd cake and biscuit have a right to be annoyed because they are the ones that will follow the rules anyway.

Checklist my DS was the same, we ate pretty healthily, fizzy drinks only on birthdays and if we were on holidays etc. DS went to Uni for 1 term, came back at Christmas and had to have his first ever filing! He had been having cans of fizzy drinks every day, and for his 5 a day of fruit and vegetables he was including yoghurt covered dried pineapple chunks (so basically all sugar), after his lunch each day . Dopey flipping teenager.

CheapSausages DS2 would drink the water, but only the merest sip.

Our school is like this, Heathy schools certification in the foyer. But when it's your child's birthday you are expected to send in sweets for the whole class! So most days there are bags of haribo or lollies coming out of school in one class or another!?!

But only healthy snacks are allowed at break time and they're trying to only allow water in lunch boxes.

Mind you they allow Year 6 boys to come to school with bleached hair but tell the girls off if they come to school in any other colour than navy or black hair bobbles...!!!

Obviously just applying a blanket ban on cake and pizza is hypocritical, they should be suggesting pizza and cake made of chosen from the same nutritional value as the schools.
Blanket banning isn’t fair, and doesn’t teach some parents and kids there are healthy versions of the same foods around.

I'm gobsmacked by a lot of this. I work in a primary school. My main role is as a lunch time supervisor. Both my children also attend the school.
We don't have a strict policy but there is a lot of advice on what not to include. Only fizzy drinks and chocolate and sweets are outright banned.
A number of children have got the worst lunch boxes. No sandwich or pasta, just cheesestrings, dairylea dinners, crisps, chocolate biscuits and a Capri Sun or similar. It's not one or two, it's loads.
We have a number of SEN children, their needs are taken into account, both with their packed lunches and school meals.
In terms of school meals, they only get milk or water to drink. There are numerous options which are pre ordered a term in advance. Every day there is a choice of fruit or yoghurt and a pudding, always low sugar, usually containing fruit.
Whilst we never force any child to eat anything, we encourage them to try things and don't let them just tear into their pudding without giving their meal a go.

Someone upthread said she didn't want to be restricted when packing her kids lunch box as they weren't overweight. Believe me normal/underweight children can be very unhealthy too.

In some of our worst cases, we have children coming in with a tub of Pringles or a 5 pack of cake bars, as their whole lunch, every day.

We have a no sweets/cakes for birthdays too, but have the occasional bake sale.

The idea that a chocolate bar/crisps every day is ok is ridiculous.

I'm another that agrees the school policy should cover school dinners and packed lunches equally. At my son's school they can have water or milk with their school lunch, they have one day a week where they have cheese and biscuits as a treat and fruit with yoghurt another day, they had jelly this week too, they tend to only get a stodgy pudding once a week. I agree that packed lunches should be allowed a treat too.

I think there should be some common sense allowed here. If the children having school dinners are getting some sort of dessert then some sort of dessert should be allowed in pack lunches.

Can there not just be a general rule around moderation? Its clearly bad if a child comes in with a happy meal and a can of coke and ten mars bars..... but putting a biscuit or something similar in an otherwise healthy pack lunch as a treat is not bad is it?

In nursery and reception at my DC's school, there's no choice, food gets brought to the table. For 2 years, once every 3 weeks, DD would tell me "it was jacket potato with cheese and I only ate the cheese." The catering staff were supposed to note this and bring DD whatever the meat option was for that day, but it never happened.

The woman wants her child to be able to have sugar free squash as they won't drink water. Not fizzy pop - a drink of squash...

Sorry (well, not really sorry) but this is bollocks.
If needed, they will drink water. The poor little mites won't dehydrate just because they got a bottle of water. It's more of a signal for the parents to rethink their children's diet.
Btw, squash, chocolate, crisps etc. are banned in my DD's school. No child has died of starvation or dehydration yet.

I remember, not so long ago, school lunches ever days offered pizza - I lived on pizza at lunch for years as it was there. I have no problem as a parent for the lunch box rules, but mirror it with what it offered as school prepared meals

Putyourdamnshoeson there was a little girl in DS's old primary that only ever had a tub of pringles as her "packed lunch" on trips out. (The school were great about it, just packed an extra sandwich lunch for her.)

Sensory issues aside, how do young kids without those issues get to the stage where they will only drink squash or fruit juice - if you'd never given it to them in the first place, how would they know?

Obviously it's different when they get to be older, as you can't control what they have in the same way, but then again aren't they are old enough to begin understanding how a healthy body needs to work? My DN is only 6, but even she understands that she needs to eat some veggies, even the one she dislikes, so her body "works well". She also has a "drink like a unicorn" water flask which shows her how much water she should have consumed by each part of the day, and she's quite religious about it, bless her.

It's so sad to hear from people who work in schools what some parents send in with their kids. How can anyone honestly think that a dairylea snack pack and a pack of 5 Cadbury mini rolls is ok??

archery it's really sad isn't It? Not to mention that if this is considered appropriate for school lunch, what are they eating at home?
Our school will provide something healthy if it happens more than once.

We have in house cooks now, the meals gave significantly improved in quality and variety. Chips once a fortnight, pizza once a month, fresh salmon. They have a very strict set of rules, calorie content, veg portions and carb/protein balance. I assumed that this was across the board. Is it just our school?