to complain about the new healthy eating policy at dc's school

[FranSanDisco]

Dc's attend the local state primary and on the whole it is a good a school. On Thursday they brought home a letter on a new healthy eating plan affecting packed lunches and snacks. I have no problem with the food they suggest for packed lunches but snacks include only : fruit, raisins and veg. No bread sticks, bread and butter or cheese which they were allowed before. Also, they intend to pre-designate certain pupils to open the lunch packs (Yr 5) and inspect them. Those failing the good food test will get a leaflet inserted and be followed up by letters/meetings for further failures - is this a little OTT or do I need a chill pill? I am really bothered by this interference and the fact that raisins aren't actually healthy for teeth so how can they ban bread sticks and cheese but OK the dried fruit. If you were me would you drop them a line?

See I give babe bell for dd2 on a tuesday and Friday but thats surely mychoice and to be told not to i would be unhappy at being told..

It does sound very odd - there was something on the news the other day about many nurseries giving food that was not substantial enough to sustain children betweeen meals i.e. just fruit.

This sounds similar. I thought that, in order to maintain healthy glycaemic levels (important in preventing diabetes in the long term), snacks should contain a little carbohydrate, a little protein and complex carbohydrate. So a few breadsticks, some cheese and cucumber, for example, would be ideal. This would also mean kids could concentrate on their work for longer.

I'm no expert and I don't yet have school-aged kids but this sounds like it is giving the wrong message about healthy eating.

food standards agency - healthy snacks for kids

Choufleur, the snack list says : Raisin or other dried fruit including fruit strings. Fresh fruit or veg sticks.

Thanks Minimarmite - says it all really.

That FSA info is in direct contradiction to what the schools are saying

I have issues similar to this - we only have 1 designated healthy snack day, but my DD1 was once told that her snack that day wasn't healthy - it was crackers with a spreading of extra light philadelphia - which I consider to be healthy for a very active 6 year old...

Basically it seems that if its not fruit its not deemed as healthy.

Seems weird, considering DD1 has a healthy snack 100% of the time, but others send their children ion with chocolate and crisps the otehr day and an apple on a wednesday but thats fine...

It does indeed, I wonder if schools that introduce fruit-only policies see a decline in behaviour/results . I honestly think it is a really worrying trend, going from one extreme to another when the middle ground is what is right.

I would be telling the school to mind their own business. Their job is to educate my child not lecture me on what my child should be eating. Surely if they wanted to make an issue about food they should teach that all foods are ok in moderation.

My DD was not allowed to eat her packed lunch because it contained nuts. Spent the day hungry. Complained to school and told there was children with nut allergies in school so they could not allow nuts. Fine - but my DD is a coeliac and no one makes allowances for her.

My DC's school provides a fruit snack for them each morning. We went to see the dental nurse for a toothbrushing lesson the other week and she food with sugars in ( including natural sugars - fruit ) should ideally be eaten at mealtimes and not snack times as more saliva is produced then and therefore the sugars aren't as damaging to the teeth.

The nanny state does piss me off.

she said food with sugars in

i agree with encouraging healthy eating

however the guidelines you have been given do not concur with government policy food standards agencytips for a healthy lunchbox

its inappropriate for year 5 children to be handling other children's food, on hygiene and other grounds.

Snack time is quite a recent thing at school though, and I think that fruit/veg is fine. Quick to eat and little mess, and picks up from the 5 a day in infant school. Given that so many people eat a totally inadequate amount of fruit and veg it is good to get in the habit of thinking about fruit/veg as both a nice and normal thing to eat. That's one of the main purposes of the push for healthy eating in schools, to try and get good habits going when children are relatively small and forming their life long habits.

The checking of lunchboxes doesn't seem like a good idea though.

This does my head in. I am a teacher and it's none of my bloody business what you feed your child. It's especially not the business of year 5 children! They haven't introduced anything like this in my school but if they did I'd just lie and say it was all healthy.

isnt it a shame when a good idea backfires

YANBU.

I'd definately adress this as they are wrong to not allow cheese, FFS! Children dont need to diet!

I also dont agree in using children to check their lunch

Id handle this in a careful way if it were me, ackowledge themn for the initiative bla bla, them gentlty riase the issue!

i'd actually just carry on putting what you want in the packed lunch. let the letters come. and attend the meeting if it comes to that. then just explain yourself. what on earth will they do to you?? how old is your child? are they old enough to understand real healthy eating? i mean so they won't feel embarrassed at 'inspection' time if they get a letter. they need to be trained to say 'ok that's fine' etc.

YANBU in the slightest
Kids checking up on kids is unwise
I agree with asking parents not to send crisps/chocolate/sweets....even cakes (maybe - although there is a world of difference between homemade flapjack with dried fruit and seeds/homemade fruit muffins and a Cadbury's mini roll) beyond that schools should butt out.

I don't think this is a recent thing - as a child in South Wales we were only allowed to bring an apple to eat at playtimes.

I take issue with lunchbox rules though - it's not my business what the children in my class eat for lunch (within reason, obviously).

Ruddynorah, my dc's are 9 (yr 4) and 7 (yr 2). They know what is healthy and what is not really healthy and what is pure junk. I told dd when she goes into Yr 5 refuse to be the 'lunch bag snooper'. She said she'd get in trouble . I think I'll raise it tactfully providing links to the website provide here plus the Dental Health site. Thanks everyone for your comments

I would complain.

I'm a teacher and our deputy head has taken it upon herself to become the food police. The situation isn't helped by the fact that she doesn't actually understand the principle of a balanced diet but works on the principe of fruit/veg good - everything else bad/forbidden.

I have refused to become involved with any vetting of lunchboxes - in fact, next weeks' staff meeting should be interesting as she has asked for it to be put on the agenda - if parents in my school complained I would be delighted.

It's not the snack advice I have a problem with, but the strange 'policing' of the lunchboxes by anyone, children or adult.

I'd be interested to see what would happen if anyone were to test these 'rules' in school. I doubt very much that anyone's child would be excluded on the basis of their lunch/snacks and social/children's sevices would laugh out loud. It's designed to put pressure on the children to put pressure on their parents.

I'm all for healthy eating but this seems a sure-fire way to make children anxious about their food .

ALMOSTMRSG- thats terrible, i cant believe the nerve of that school leaving your dd to starve!!! I hope you complained to the authoritys about that. If it were my ds, i would have gone to the papers!
OP- the school have no legal right to search lunch boxes, or anything else, only the police have the power to search peoples posessions. And using other kids to do it, is just absurd, what if one of those 'lunch box officers' is a bully? They could gob in the other kids food! (sorry if anyones eating their tea!)
Theres nothing wrong with cheese, its not as if your sending your dc's to school with a king-size mars bar!
I would just continue to send them to school with whatever you want to give them, and tell the school where to stick their policy!!!

its true shiny. i read somewhere that after you are 7 you don't absorb calcium as much so really we should be packing as much dairy into kids as poss.

sorry but it all seems so irrational. surely what kids/parents need to learn is all about moderation in their diets...surely??

i am still astonished about the cheese. its cheese fgs!!