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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think pupils shouldn't have to go without food for 5 hours!!!

111 replies

karise · 08/12/2008 09:22

Just dropped DD off at school. They have a school trip today & we were told to take everything back home with us except their lunchbox & waterbottle!
AIBU to think that it is important for 4 & 5 year olds to be allowed to take a snack if they aren't due back to school for lunch until 1pm?
I just thank God there are no diabetic's in DD's class

OP posts:
DoesntChristmasDragOn · 08/12/2008 13:36

I managed to survive school with only lunch to keep me going.

MummyDoIt · 08/12/2008 13:39

We had a tuck shop, MorningPaper, but I suspect the sweets I had from there most mornings were responsible for the mouth full of fillings I have now.

LittleJingleBellas · 08/12/2008 14:09

oh FGS

It is BAD nutritional practice to go without food for a long time. Obesity is NOT caused by snacks. Our bodies are designed to have small meals often. The 3 meals a day without snacks pattern was developed in order to fit in with work but in terms of digestion and nutrition, it's a bad idea. MUCH healthier is six v. small meals per day.

I can't believe people and schools -particularly with the current mania for health - are still promoting this outdated nonsense of 3 over-filling meals a day no snacks as being somehow healthy.

pudding25 · 08/12/2008 14:09

I don't see what the problem is in children having a mid morning healthy snack (fruit/veg).

Also, whenever I have taken kids on a school trip (KS1), we have always eaten our snack on the coach (I just ask the driver nicely and take plastic bags for rubbish). It is the highlight of the trip!

nickytinseltimes · 08/12/2008 14:16

This kind of thing drives me nuts.

In the school dh works in, kids are allowed to drink water during class.

Ffs, they can last an hour and a half without water surely?

No bloody self restraint or self discipline.

LynetteScavo · 08/12/2008 14:19

karise - is this school not in England?

DS2's school take thier regular milk cartons and fruit on trips with them.

The milk is free for under 5's, and the fruit is free - I presumed every child had this.

LittleJingleBellas · 08/12/2008 14:29

What a backward idea, that dehydration = self displine and self restraint.

The reason children are allowed to drink in class, is because research has shown that properly hydrated children have better concentration and get better results. They are also more likely to take more exercise and less likely to wet the bed. That is why having water whenever you want (as adults do) is promoted as part of the Healthy Schools agenda.

iwouldgoouttonight · 08/12/2008 14:30

I agree with what LittleJingleBellas just said. It is much better for you to regularly eat small healthy snacks than having three big meals and nothing in between.

IIRC if you don't eat for five hours or so your body goes into starvation mode (not sure if its actually called that, but something along those lines!) and thinks its not going to get any food so begins to store fat. If you eat small snacks regularly your body is always ticking over and your metabolism speeds up, meaning its much less likely you'll become overweight.

Obviously this is dependent on the snacks being healthy and not crisps, chocolate, etc.

If I don't get a chance to have a snack mid morning I feel faint!

Mercy · 08/12/2008 14:36

Agree with LittleJB too.

Both my dc need a mid-morning snack when they are at school and so do I. I also feel faint if I don't eat a banana or something then.

We are a bit of a snacky family I suppose. And we are all thin.

KatieDD · 08/12/2008 14:45

My poor little 4 year old seems to think she's been missed off the dinner list for the past 2 days, DH is trying to get to the bottom of it today, but if she has then thank goodness for mid morning snack otherwise she'd not have eaten from 7.30am to 4pm

chocolatedot · 08/12/2008 14:51

How do you all eat together as family if you eat six small meals a day?

Mercy · 08/12/2008 14:57

We only eat together at weekends and holidays.

LittleJingleBellas · 08/12/2008 15:00

Same way you do 3 meals a day.

Though you don't eat every meal together anyway when DC's are at school, do you?

chocolatedot · 08/12/2008 15:00

Having a proper 2 course sit-down evening meal together every day is the single most important thing we do together as a family. The children love it, it's a great time for talking and it's an opportunity to introduce them to all sorts of new foods. If we'd all been snacking all day, it just wouldn't work.

chocolatedot · 08/12/2008 15:03

Well obviously we don't have lunch together when they're at school but we certainly have a proper breakfast and evening meal together, so 2 out of 3. They have a fruit snack for school but I never given them one in the holidays or weekends and they never ask.

Mercy · 08/12/2008 15:09

It's almost impossible for us to eat together during the week.

We all get up and come home at different times (and when the dc are older I'm sure they will no longer need dinner at 5.30)

piscesmoon · 08/12/2008 15:12

I don't think that constant grazing is healthy.

herbietea · 08/12/2008 15:12

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

elliott · 08/12/2008 15:14

Personally, I think a lot of those 4 and 5 year olds are going to be quite grumpy by the time they get back to school!
(speaking as someone who is always ravenous by midday!)

chocolatedot · 08/12/2008 15:19

If you're ravenous at midday, perhaps you need a bigger / lower GI breakfast? I always try to have scrambled eggs on wholegrain toast or porridge (even though it's the last thing I feel like at 7am) and it means I genuinely don't get hungry until 12.30 or 1.00pm. Years ago, I used to grab a muffin or similar on my way to work and by 10.30 would be almost faint with hunger.

Ever since I have followed a low GI diet, I have been free of hunger pangs between meals and don't put on weight.

jesusofutopia · 08/12/2008 15:24

I really can't be doing with greedy, british kids.

"Ooo I need to eat every 5 minutes or I'll starve to death"

"For my breakfast my 3 year old eats a bowl of cereal, 4 slices of toast, a yogurt, a banana...." FFS is there any wonder British kids are so fat?

They'll survive without a mid-morning snack, kids in other countries seem to manage

piscesmoon · 08/12/2008 15:33

If they get used to grazing they are never actually hungry enough to appreciate a proper nutritious meal.
The healthy diet is to breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and have an evening meal like a pauper- it doesn't have anything to do with snacking everytime you have the slightest hunger pang.
If you are going to eat little and often then they shouldn't be empty calories with sugar and processed food.

elliott · 08/12/2008 15:41

Or perhaps I really need someone to give me unsolicited advice about my diet ?
If you are really interested, I have porridge oats and fruit for breakfast (pretty low GI I imagine), and, as I said, am always ravenous by midday. I would be very grumpy by 1pm, so I imagine some of those children will be too!

LittleJingleBellas · 08/12/2008 15:50

FGS. How the hell does eating a healthy mid morning snack constitute eating every 5 minutes and being greedy?

Mercy · 08/12/2008 16:01

Maybe some of us just have different metabolisms.

I have my breakfast at around 7.15, by 10.30 I'm starving again. My dc are pretty much the same.

I'm not remotely fat or greedy and neither are my children (most children need a high number of calories in relation to their size)

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