to want SOME control over packed lunches?

[kinderfool]

DD's (6yo) first day back at school today and she was a bit nervous about her new class so in her packed lunch, besides her drinks bottle, ham sandwich, a plum, piece of cheese (proper cheese not cheese spread or something) and a box of cherry tomatoes (at least 10 or more), I put in a Kinder egg (a massive treat for her) to cheer her up.

Comes to pick up and she'd had a reasonable day but was anxious to tell me she'd really wanted to eat her egg but hadn't been allowed. Checked her lunch bag expecting that she'd tried to eat that first and been stopped but after checking first and asking her, found out she'd eaten every crumb of everything else and had one little bite of choc before the TA watching stopped her. And it wasn't as if certain things aren't allowed, there's no nut allergy notifications at her school, and no set down rules about what can/can't be brought.

Now I completely sympathise with the need to crack down on kids who get a lunch of Coke, crisps and chocolate AND would completely understand if it was the toy they'd objected to (but dd was told by me she could eat the egg but not to even open the toy bit, to bring it home with her instead and knowing her she'd have repeated this parrot-style to the TA), but this just seems completely overboard for the first day.

As far as I can see, what I sent her with is a balanced meal so as long as it stays that way it should be of no concern to anyone else what I want her to eat. Plus she's a skinny little thing (thanks to never staying still) so the very last thing I need is someone putting ideas into her head that it's only ever acceptable to eat uber-healthy foods.

AIBU to, in a very polite and reasonable way, tell the TA to keep her nose out?

lol

so there are two alternatives: Nepalese food or processed crap

right

you have no idea what i feed my children and you are getting rather carried away with self-righteousness

(I will tell you, if you want, from brown rice to zinc supplements, but it might not fit your world view)

I haven't brought dd up on Nepalese food or processed crap - bugger, I can't have fed her anything then, no wonder she's so skinny! And surprisingly each child is different and so are their metabolisms, daily exercise and food requirements. As it happens, dd survived through nursery because they offered fruit and crackers/savoury biscuits twice a day besides lunch, and breakfast and/or an 'early tea' if they were there that long. And their lunches were far more balanced than anything I've seen offered in dd's school (hence why she nearly always had a cooked lunch at nursery and packed lunches at school). Plus they were open to treating each child as an individual - one wasn't a fruit fan so they got into a pattern of just giving him pear/apple (whereas the others had a wide variety) and some ate more than others if needed - and at no point did they have to change their policy because one child caused a riot about not having precisely the same as everyone else. I haven't experience of very 'restrictive' schools so can't comment there.

Don't be deliberately obtuse. The point is your children only NEED these foods because you have raised them to do so. Hundreds of thousands of children thrive without them. So I don't quite see your logic.
Ps it is not self righteousness, it is just nutritionally accurate

Hundreds of thousands of children thrive without antibacterial soap, or a wide variety of fruit, or a good daily dose of protein, or readily-accessible antibiotics, or a variety of different grains in their diet but I'm trying to raise my children the most sensible (within reason) way I know in the country they live, not the minimum neccessary to thrive.

Asking for the right I repeat ,the right (as opposed to obligation) to give your child a piece of choc does not mean you are going to give it to them every single day of the week. It just means that when you want to maybe,possibly, give them some you are allowed without being made to feel like you are an unfit parent! I really do not think it is too much to ask.

Definitely agree with kinderfool's point about ways of life. I find most electic gadgets an utter non sense (exept a computer to be able to Mn and moan) and they are IMO much more damageable than the odd chocolate square but I do not go arround telling people they they are not educating their DCs properly because they own such items (nintendo DS, Tv in bedroom...)

clemette you are talking nonsense

So, the debate has moved from those who argue it is a RIGHT to feed their children whatever they choose to those who argue their children NEED chocolate/cakes/biscuits at school. When I suggest this is not actually nutritionally accurate for a child with a balanced diet (a view shared by government and NHS nutritionists) I am talking nonsense. The hundreds of thousands of children who thrive without daily treads live in Britain, not some imagined developing country, so if a child cannot get through a morning without more than fruit or milk then the "fault" lies with the parents who have brought them up to expect such. Or perhaps the problem is an inadequate breakfast.
I don't care what you feed your children, and my children do have treats but they don't NEED them to get through the day.

PS when did antibac soap become a necessity of the modern world???!

I go with Patrick Holford any day and I defend my decision to give my children a one-minute chocoloate wolf down. Perhaps I shouldn't because Twix is not available in Nepal? Well, it's a free country and I don't think I should be SHOUTED at for this DECISION.

If you want to talk about ghee and dal bhat and so forth well, you know, global nutrition is a big debate. You could have picked India instead of Nepal -- not much chocolate there, but a truckload of clarified butter. But imo that's too big for this thread.

Clemette, it is the same thing!

In our school it went from no rule at all to :

• lets have crisps every day but fruits only on friday.

Then they decided:

• it is not far enough, from now on fruits only exept friday when they can at what they want.

Sorry but I will NOT let school decide for me when it is or not ok to give a fruit or a cereal bar/chocolate to my child!
If I decide to give my child a "non fruit" snack on a Wedneday because they have got PE or swimming rather than on a Friday I will!

Can't believe the mean comments you've been subjected to, kinderfool . I would have been peeved in your situation, too, although since it's the thought that counts, hopefully the kinderegg did its job of cheering your DC up, regardless of whether it got consumed or not. DC have had the very occasional chocolate creme egg or similar item in their packed lunch (typically in the week before Easter).

DC would run screaming in panic from the likes of tomato, humus and cucumber sarnies.

I find the whole thread extraordinary! It has already been said that parents don't want soft drink companies marketing their DC, they don't want vending machines with fizzy drinks in school and they expect the school to produce healthy, nutritious food and yet they reserve the absolute right to give their DC sugary or salty snacks when ever and where ever they see fit!
There would be an outcry if the school handed out a chocolate bar and a packet of monstermunch on a Friday!!

I think that back in the dark ages, when I went to school, the LEA was very enlightened by not allowing packed lunches! You had school meals or went home. No wonder you didn't have a child obesity problem.

I still think that it is sad that those of you who insist on your 'rights' don't give a damn about poor obese DC with the lunch box that doesn't hold a nutritionally balanced lunch-after all your 'little darling' isn't overweight and only has the chocolate as part of a very healthy diet.

There is a child obesity problem and I can't see why the sensible parent can't simply back up the school-it may only be a drop in the ocean but you have to start somewhere.

"There would be an outcry if the school handed out a chocolate bar and a packet of monstermunch on a Friday!!"

Maybe, maybe not. But then it's not for the school to make that decision on a regular basis, is it?

"No wonder you didn't have a child obesity problem."

Don't really understand why you think if someone feeds 'junk' at lunchtime at home there would be less chance of obesity than if the same was fed at school. Unless you are allowing for the walk to home and back being exercise, I suppose.

And I think it has already been said that the parents of the"poor obese DC with the lunch box that doesn't hold a nutritionally balanced lunch-after " should be dealt with directly and possibly referred to other agencies if a real problem.

"'little darling' "?

just dripping in uncalled for sneering sarcasm for the sole reason that some parents object to having their parental responsibility undermined. Why?

Piscesmoon - there would be an outcry because the school is not dd's parent, they may be in loco parentis but that does not mean from 8.30-3.30 they are her parents - they take over certain responsibilities but I am still ultimately 'in charge' of her welfare. That's why it doesn't work both ways - on certain things I can make decisions that the school have no right to. If they feel it's good for her to go swimming and I say no, what I say goes. Same for R.E., sex education etc etc. Obviously the school has rules which I have agreed to, either explicity or just by sending her (no choc is NOT one of their rules) and if they feel I'm harming her of course they have to take relevant action but beyond that it's not a jobshare. And it's precisely because I DON'T throw out sugary or salty snacks and, to the best of my knowledge, provide a well balanced diet, that I want to keep decisions about that to myself.

Of course I give a damn about obese children but my highest priority is to make sure my dd isn't one of them, surely the last thing any problem needs is one more child added to the list. I have a complete conviction that the major cause of every 'problem with food' (including both ends of the scale, such as anorexia and obesity) is poor education about food and a 'warped' view on diet ('good food', 'bad food', sweets = love etc). So the best thing I can do is first make sure my dd knows and SEES that every food fits into the whole diet in some way, learning about what you need to eat more of, what you don't need to eat so often etc. Banning any food from her diet (as she has no allergies), regardless of what meal it happens to fall on seems to me to go against this. Obviously I don't mean every food is included in every meal but none are automatically out of bounds.

Beyond that yes I'd like to see something done to help children who are already obese and whose parents need help with providing a reasonable diet but straight bans just put a bigger divide between home and school life when surely a child should know there is one attitude to have to food and they should be encouraged to have that attitude 24/7. I don't think dd's school for one currently does this that well which is why I offer suggestions, attend meetings, try to change things through the 'proper channels'.

However while I have such a major influence over my own dd I will of course use it to show her what I see as sensible.

(already said earlier the toy aspect was wrong in hindsight, the dc's are allowed their own toys at school but at lunch was the wrong time, but I feel the discussion has moved solely onto the chocolate/'junk' side)

I really give up on this! I think it is horrible for anyone to expect the school to target some poor woman who can't cook and has no understanding of nutrition and 'educate' her. It is much simpler to have a very simple rule to not have sweets and crisps in a lunch box. Someone counted the hours at school and the hours at home way back on this thread. No one is asking people to never give them to their DC-just to desist in the school lunch box.

The one point that hits me is that the parent must have the 'right' to do what ever they like to, or with, their DC at all times. They don't wish to take any responsibility at all for the knock on effect that it has on any other DC at school.
The 'little darling' bit comes from 'I'm all right Jack-I don't care what little Johnny eats and I don't care that the school makes his mother seem dreadful-I'm a good mother and Johnny's mother isn't-tell her what to give her DC but leave me alone!'

Poor little Johnny then has to sit in the lunch hall and have his chocolate confiscated while little Tom (with the nutritionally 'clued up' mother) eats his chocolate bar in front of poor little Johnny.
All Johnny knows is that life is unfair!!

I shall resist all temptation to say another word on the subject.

Is it really so dreadful for your DC to manage without chocolate and crisps for 6 hours?

I'm obviously a lost cause-I think all DCs should go swimming, go to RE lessons and have sex education. I hate all the my DC and the control. It takes a village to raise a DC. How can they possibly make up their minds about beliefs and whether they have any or not if they don't hear all about them?
I disagree entirely with 'this is what mummy thinks therefore you must think it'! Swimming may save their life and is an essential skill. I know that you can withdraw from sex education and RE, I had no idea that you could withdraw from school swimming lessons-probably because I have never known a child be withdrawn.
I will sit on my hands and not respond again-whatever the temptation!
What is so wrong with no chocolate for 6 hours other than taking away parent's 'rights'?

Sorry about the punctuation-or lack of it!

Sorry if I implied I disagreed with RE/swimming lessons/sex ed, I actually agree with all 3 and don't intend to withdraw dd from any of them but IF I wanted to I could whether the school wanted her to go or not. (One dc was withdrawn from swimming lessons in the year above dd - he'd previously gone and there was no obvious reason why, such as a broken bone etc so I have no idea why).

Have nothing against dd experiencing other beliefs/opinions but until she's old enough to make up her own mind I have to 'force' her to follow some of my beliefs, such as not living off 4 punnets of strawberries and a packet of hula hoops per day (her dream).

Agree that many people should have influence on a child but someone ultimately has to make decisions and that should be parents/guardians. Not in a 'I need control' way but because the parents should be the ones prepared to 'mop up' if anything goes wrong so they have to be able to take steps to ensure it doesn't. In the end I will be the one who has to look after dd if she becomes obese/anorexic/diabetic etc (until she can look after herself of course) so I have to make as many decisions as I can to ensure that doesn't happen.

Doesn't our entire society run on the idea that you look after your 'own' (whether yourself, your dc's, your job etc), the people who do it effectively or without risking harm are left to their own devices and the people who aren't doing it so well are given help (or 'punishment' if talking about something more extreme)? If little Johnny sees that no-one at school eats choc/crisps but he gets fed them all the hours he has at home is he going to learn anything about diet? Of course confiscating his entire lunch is downright cruel, there are other options than that. But until the parents providing a 'junk' lunch are educated not to then no problem is actually being solved. If the parents can manage to comply with a straight ban they can surely be encouraged and educated what a normal diet should be?

And I saw the hours count (although the person counting included time spent asleep - I'm presuming that shouldn't be time for eating anything, whether chocolate or not) but as I previously said, I feel it's potentially harmful for dd to see that certain foods are only ok at home/ out of school. To my mind that's one path to generating the stereotypical 'crash diet in front of everyone else, binge on ice cream at home, no idea how I got so overweight' type of person.

(I know you've sworn off replying piscesmoon but I had to respond to those points.)

"I think it is horrible for anyone to expect the school to target some poor woman who can't cook and has no understanding of nutrition and 'educate' her. It is much simpler to have a very simple rule to not have sweets and crisps in a lunch box"

But piscesmoon, if the problem is that the "poor woman" can't cook (and I'm sure it's much more complicated than that), wouldn't it be much better to devote attention to addressing her (or his; we don't want to be sexist) shortcomings rather than waste time, energy and money pursuing simplistic, blunt-instrument, policies that achieve little (since the meals at school are such a small proportion of the child's total diet) and can do harm (undermine parental authority/ promote skewed attitudes to food, etc)?

Given ds's allergies and associated food issues I have had the benefits of a few experts from dietician to child psychologist. A recurring theme is that there is no such thing as bad food there is just food. In fact crisps were viewed as a useful way of exploring flavours. If my school was to have a blanket ban then the strategies I use to increase his calories would not be allowed. Ever wanted to know what a hungry child is like in the afternoon?

My school does have a blanket ban on nuts but given that my ds is the one with the most severe allergies they would have to ban seasame seeds, cheese, banana, chick peas and egg as well. From a practical point of view I think bans are hard to police which is why I have never asked then to extend their ban on nuts to the other food groups. If I did a lot of parents would have something to say.

Unrelated to the main cut and thrust of this thread, but what seeker said cut me to the quick.

I thought she looked lovely in her hand-dyed tie-dyed organic cotton baby-gro.
I didn't know my lovingly created work of art would dye my baby blue. She looked like a Boudicca supporter, all swirls and woad.
My mother took years to stop making snide and giggly comments, and you brought it all back seeker.

well hang on a minute pisces

some children are missing out whatever happens

and at the moment it's mine, so you can share the "poor little Johnny" out a bit if you don't mind

or give up on it altogether

it cuts both ways

I think that what people are missing out on here is that we have a publically funded health system in the UK. If it was true that only parents had to pay for the issues caused by obesity then perhaps it would be fair enough to say I'm alright Jack. But actually we all pay for the services for those who are obese/anorexic/diabetic etc and that cost is going to go up and up and up as the incidence of obesity increases. Given how much of that growth is in children, and that research shows that poor eating habits are often embedded in childhood then intervention at this point makes a great deal of sense. It should be allied to community outreach and other healthy eating programmes, and in fact there are a huge range of different initiatives to try and do something about obesity (and there probably should be more, but unfortunately it is a great deal harder to argue for spending money on prevention than on for example heart bypasses even though research shows that prevention and early intervention is a much more cost effective approach).

The reasons why schools are thought to be good places for health interventions aimed at children is that pretty much all children attend school, so it is a good way to target all children (and cheap too - asking schools to ban chocolate/sweets/fizzy drinks costs very very little). Targeted intervention requires mechanisms to identify children at risk and then resources to try and intervene on a one on one basis. The cost of running programmes like this would be very very large (bearing in mind something like 1 in 3 children leaving primary school are overweight or obese). Now as the current approaches to try to reduce obesity are not working very well maybe that's the way that things will have to go, but please don't fool yourself into thinking that having lots of really fat children and adults has no cost or impact on everyone else. Or that it is a small minority with a problem.

Nb I do think that some schools manage their programmes really badly, and that seriously increasing exercise at school should be part of the plan - I live in Canada at the moment (hence weird posting time) which also has a serious obesity issue and whilst we have little or no healthy eating stuff we have a requirement of an hour of every school day for sport/exercise.

Piscemon you still have not come with a reason why it is ok for children who eat school dinners to have a sugary desert and not to the ones who have a lunch box. Why should my child eat an apple a break AND lunch because he brings a lunch box? while their friends eat chocolate cake or ice cream?

I stand by what I was saying at the beginning of the thread, this policies are aimed at stoping parents to give a packed luch and go for school lunch instead. Until someone comes and proves to me that the lunch they serve at school is healthier than the one I pack with all my love and all my best knowledge of balancec nutrition, I will just not asccept any imput of the school in it!

Accept, not Asccept

It all seems like a power struggle to me between the teachers and the parents Confiscating items out of a school lunc box undermines the parent in the child's eyes.