Just got criticized for portion size for pre school packed lunch

[VixStarr]

My DS has just started at pre -school and i got advised today that I should give smaller portions. I am livid because even though I explained my reasons for giving larger sized portions I felt as I wasn't being listened to. I was told that I shouldn't feed him all the time ( he is a grazer) but he says he is hungry all the time - so what do i do not feed him?

I don't have a car so DS scoots/walks to pre school which is a mile away ( so its a two mile trip), he is very active - as in if you don't exercise him he gets very irritable/challenging, and more importantly i have never pushed this idea of having a clean plate as i come from a different cultural background. I must add that actually he walks 2 miles a day, every day regardless of its pre school or not thinking about it. I don't expect DS to eat all that I give him and he knows this. Although since starting pre school he thinks he has to eat everything which i am honestly baffled by.

But pre-school started trying to ply me with leaflets and this talk of the obseity crisis. Just for info he has had so far for lunch for pre school. Cheddar/courgette and carrot mini muffins/ mini fish cakes/ fish, rice and veg/ pasta with broccoli and tomato sauce. He has cheese, grapes, blueberries and a pot of plain yoghurt with passionfruit with the 'mains.'

So could someone please tell me a) specify what they give their children and how much particularly if they are active. DS is 98 cm and 14 kg b) how can i get across to DS that I don't mind if he doesn't eat all of his lunch c) try to get staff to understand that I actually don't overfeed my child d) tell me if i am actually in the wrong completely.

Will he eat cooked chicken? Strips of that, fruit, veg sticks, home made cake/small portion of crisps (I halve a pack between DD (3) & DS (4). That's slightly more manageable. Throw in some cubes of cheese or something.

I work in a nursery and some children have loads and some don't have enough. Personally I prefer seeing children with a full lunchbox ( we only open things one at a time so reduces waste) then the ones that have a slice of cold toast and a packet of crisps

DS is at preschool.

For his packed lunch he had:

Half a philadelphia and cucumber sandwich. (So normal sandwich with 2 slices, cut into quarters, with 2 going in the packed lunch).

Yoghurt.

Banana.

Carrot sticks.

The sandwich varies, as does the fruit choice.

The preschool are stricter than the school - ask firmly for no crisps or biscuits, limited salty things and not keen on cheese strings. I don't actually mind so much.

Why do you give him more than you think he will eat?
He won't be allowed to "graze" through the day at school; and the dinner ladies will probably encourage him to finish what's in his lunch box.

I don't see what the problem is. You offer him large portions but he rarely eats it all, so just give smaller portions.

My boys (youngest is 5) eat:

Breakfast: scrambled eggs & 1 slice toast/ porridge/ pancakes
Mid morning: pancake and butter
Packed lunch - sandwich/ toastie/ pasta pesto, fruit, yogurt, biscuit
Mid afternoon - nuts and raisins or crumpet & jam, apple
Dinner - normal small portion of family meal and pudding (chocolate mouse or yogurt).

Both are beanpoles - not a scrap on them.

Both would wail and climb the walls if they didn't have a mid morning and afternoon snack - they wouldn't survive on just fruit.

I do however, think you are making a rod for your own back offering up so much variety. It's just not sustainable going forward and if I were you I would adopt the traditional packaged lunch (carton of fruit juice + 4 other things) model. Once school starts he will not want to spend the whole lunch hour eating!

Thanks for all the tips: the note is a fantastic idea. Chicken strips are on the menu for next week too and I will try more drinking too.

I just wanted to point out which i should have done in the op that I only offer a larger portion at lunch because of the reasons stated in the op. I don't offer unnecessarily large portions at any other times and dish up what i think he will probably have. I think its difficult to gauge without the benefit of time, of how much to offer when you don't see them between 9 - 3 and see what they are up too. DS eats a lot in the morning and lunch time and has a very small dinner at home.

Like I said I have agreed to smaller portions for lunch. I think i will see how this goes and then speak to staff again on the matter if its coming back completely empty to see what else he is eating while he is there/ if he starts to eat an incredible amount at dinner time.

I am ( now only slightly) miffed that my efforts to create a healthy attitude to food is being slightly thwarted. I just am against the eat up/everything attitude - its just goes everything that was ingrained in me. Arrrgggh i hate this letting go business and its only just started.

I'm not surprised he's a grazer - he eats so often (or is offered food so often) that he probably never really gets hungry.

He's not bothered about eating much possibly because he knows he'll be offered food again shortly!

Children really don't need to be eating all day long. Of course they need plenty of nutritious food especially when so active but he won't be able to eat constantly when at school and as a teen/young adult.

He may be having a small dinner due to the amount he has already eaten?

2014newme

Spot on there. But as a family we all eat like that. It reminds me of that saying eat like a king for breakfast, a pauper for dinner or something to that effect. I personally don't think you should be having really heavy dinners in the evening so having a small dinner doesn't concern me

Sidge

He is a grazer and he eats a proper breakfast and lunch. I know he won't be able to graze later on in his schooling life ( very easily in any case) and i am sure he/ i will change in that respect but it doesn't have to happen quite now?. In the short time he has been at pre school he has eaten all his lunch with the exception of today and that's because i genuinely think he wasn't hungry today ( didn't ask for pre or after preschool snack). He eats a lot because he is active. The poor boy is forced to walk/scoot everywhere because i don't have a car or a double pushchair. The two miles I am talking about is the bare minimum so doesn't include the other monkeying around he gets up to.

No HV, doctor, other health professional, family or friends have ever said to me they are concerned with his health/weight up until now. DS looks slim ( can see ribs, i have to put elastic in his trousers) and is where he should be on the centile chart so i was frankly baffled by this portion size talk.

I think this is a common problem with preschools and schools tbh. I ended up speaking to his teacher because they were trying to micromanage what order he ate his food in, and how much, and actually I think that's batshit crazy when all his food is healthy; he knows better than they do what he wants to eat on any given day.

I hate the whole "eat up" attitude and IMO that is, along with an excess of sugar, behind the obesity crisis. A child who eats until they're full and then stops won't get fat, and arguing "portion control" is missing the point that you WANT them to leave something because they're learning to listen to hunger then, not automatically clear their plates. Very occasionally DS will eat all his lunch; most days he won't. Some days he'll eat the fruit and the yoghurt, others he'll eat all his main and leave the rest. And he's fit, well, and bang on the right weight for his height. I just want them to leave him alone so he establishes instinctively good eating habits. If they are flapping about portion control, then they're encouraging him to eat till the food is gone rather than to hunger.

I sympathise. They seem to have swallowed all the HEALTHY EATING message whole without taking the time to digest it, so to speak.

I get what you're saying about trying to let HIM decide when he's full but I really wonder about the wisdom of allowing snacks whenever they are requested?
Children do not have the same restraint as adults and want everything 'right now' so I often wonder about people who feed their children a constant supply of snacks. Are the children maybe just being allowed to eat as they wish and never really experience hunger?
I'm not saying either way is right, I'm just wondering how - when trying to encourage a healthy attitude to food - allowing instant gratification is healthy?

I understand where you are coming from about the instant gratification. I am aware of getting into bad habits with snacks and the potential repurcussions. When I am unsure as to whether DS is hungry I will ask him to wait and leave it ten minutes or so ( usually because I am sorting out DS2) and if he asks again I know he is actually hungry. DS never says I want x, y, z he just says he is hungry again so I offer him say an apple and it is very much that's what you can have - take it or leave it. Nothing else is offered. Doing these two things in my case helps to eliminates having a snack for the sake of having one. I am not saying that this is the right way just the ones that work for me

Dds lunch at pre school consisted of:

Sandwich (one slice of bread)
Cucumber/pepper sticks
Fruit
Yogurt

She's now seven and would take about three days to eat the amount of food stated in your op

I don't see that anyone's thwarting anything they have twenty mins to eat so just give a smaller lunch he had time to eat.

You don't need a banquet in a box to allow a "healthy attitude"

Do sandwiches and then he can have a cooked tea and actually eat it.

It honestly is a ton of food.

It's probably just hard to see from the inside because your used to it.

I meant to say, I'm with you on the eating up thing. Thy shouldn't be pushed to clear plates.

But give them too much and he probably spends to much time packing/unpacking his lunch and deciding what to eat and not having time to actually eat it.

What you are giving sounds a grat range and a healthy range of food however the amount seems awfully wasteful. You basically sending a lunch in he has no chance of eating.

DD and DS (3&4) have:

Sandwich- 2 slices of bread, usually ham/ pesto pasta
Half packet crisps
Apple/banana/pear
Cucumber and carrot sticks
Yoghurt/frube/jelly
Cereal type bar/nutri grain/cake

I don't think the number of items your DS has is excessive. The amount of food on top of the cooked bit might be. He may also be having an afternoon snack at pre-school too. We have a crackers/toast/fruit/veg/breadsticks rota with an AM and PM snack.

He sounds slim (my DS is the same age, a little shorter, a little heavier and bang in the 50th centile) and active so he is obviously having the right amount of food for him.

I would guess the issue is more that he is taking too long to eat, the lunch time staff are frustrated about helping him open lots of boxes, or they are trying to get him to eat everything in his lunch box.

Maybe ask for a formal meeting with them to find out what the actual problem is? Point out he obviously isn't overfed or overweight, so that's not the issue here.

My DS is also at nursery 9-3 and quite often comes home with some of his lunch untouched as he "ran out of time". He just has it as a snack when he gets in.

VixStarr - sounds like you have a really sensible approach to snacks. You are actually incredibly lucky your DS will eat so well, I have had years of struggle with my DS with food and would dearly love for him to ask for a snack! I think this is why I notice when other children actually ask for food! Totally alien to me!

I have a preschooler and a reception child they have similar to the following

Breakfast: handful bran flakes with oat milk (we r dairy free) pice of fruit toast and if we have time boiled egg usually half each

If at home they'd have a snack mid morning but at school they have water and fruit and preschooler gets toast aswell

Lunch as they r slow eaters for their lunch boxes they get
Crackers (whole wheat ones) slices of cheese strips of chicken breast slices of cucumber and carrot sticks sometimes ham or salami as a treat/ egg roll/ jam sandwich (1slice)/ cheese roll/chicken cucumber carrot sweetcorn & pasta in a small pot with French dressing/ tuna mayo & sweetcorn roll wrap or pastaetc etc with carton of apple juice yogurt satsuma already peeled and in a pot and either raisins or banana. At home they have a cooked lunch but I do lunches like above for school
as I know they can and will eat it in the time they have I'm lucky our school will not force them to finish anything and let them stop when full but will tell u if they say they haven't eaten something bcos they didn't like it.

They have a snack in the car on the way back from school usually rice cakes banana or similar but once every couple of wks I let them have a treat.

They will then get a light snack when they get home bread sticks and dips toast fruit glass of oat milk etc etc

Dinner is normal family type stuff then they have a light snack before bed if they don't have a pudding.

Both my boys r underweight ds1 has glue ear hence y he's so tired and hungry as his body is working harder just to keep up at school ds2 is actually on 0.4 centile for weight but has massive tonsils

So what u r feeding ur ds doesn't sound excessive to me but obv I have skinny Minnie's that I'm trying to get calories in to lol

Maybe try ur ds with some quick picky foods if it's just a time issue but he doesn't sound overweight to me I'd love it if my ds2 weighed that he's only 11kg I'd say they weren't aiming the obesity lark at u and it's a blanket thing x

O I also make mini pizzas completely from scratch I make a batch of sauce put in to little bags and a batch of dough which I split in to little balls and freeze then I just leave out a bag of dough and a bag of sauce flatten the balls out to pizza shape put sauce on dump cheese on top throw in the oven ready in 10/15 mins. My dough is also 50/50 white whole meal and I sneak lots of veggies in the sauce

Giles I don't think (?) OP is sending all those mains in on one day - my understanding was she was describing the kinds of food she sends in as mains, and it would be one per day. One main plus two kinds of fruit and a yoghurt, plus small piece of cheese on top, doesn't sound that different to what you offer, really, does it?

Not everyone's kids will eat sandwiches. Mine won't. I sent him in with them in his preschool because I assumed he'd eat them when he was hungry, and then they asked me to stop and to send him something else as he wasn't getting much lunch. Now I send in pasta or a homemade cheese and leek scone or something instead.

Having said that, he gets three meals a day plus a snack at school break and a snack when getting out of school, as he's ravenous. He's always allowed an apple, though, but he is in the habit of asking even though I never refuse that. He's not allowed anything else on a normal day. He eats at mealtimes, not at will, because if he's not good and hungry he won't eat the most nourishing options, which are his main meals.

Gosh yes, heaven forbid your son should be given food when he is hungry and allowed to stop when he's full. And stop with all the home made food - how will you know if he's had his daily allowance of sugar and preservatives?

When are we going to wake up and realise what we're doing to our kids?

woman

I'm not quite sure what you mean by that post.

No ones said to stop giving him
Home made stuff. And no ones not feeding him when he's hungry.

They just want him to have a smaller lunch most likely because they only have twenty mins to eat. If he's spending half that time asking for help to open tubs/bags/etc then he's getting even less time to eat.

What is the point of sending in more food than is physically possible to eat?

And yes they commented he's always eating. As someone said above he's having :

Breakfast
Snack at doors
Snack at pre school
Lunch
Snack at doors
More snacks at home
Tea

That's a ton of food and it never ceases to amaze me the absolute mass of food kids eat on MN and it doesn't Mather how much it is people always come along and say it's fine or their kid eats more

As for "stopping when he's full" with that lot I'm surprised he's even hungry. How can he stop when he's full? He's probably more likely to be eating when he's not hungry which isn't the point at all surely?

And 3/4/5 year olds often confuse thirst or wind or boredome for hunger. Him saying he is hungry and managing to eat the food doesn't mean he's actually hungry.

When are we going to wake up and realise what we're doing to our kids?

You mean by constantly letting them snack and giving food as soon as they say they want some? I know its not a good situation really.

It is good for people to feel hungry, we don't need to eat constantly or at the first sign of a hunger 'pang' but that seems to have been forgotten with the snacking culture we have now.

Going by an awake from 7-7 so up 12 hours.

He's pretty much eating every hour and a half.

The stomach takes at least 2/3 hours to empty.

I think there are two separate issues here.

Snacking at will is a bad habit. Kids learn to eat when bored, and may not eat the properly balanced meals they need. That's not ideal. I think meals should be like bedtimes: predictable and consistent.

Providing healthy and palatable food three times a day, plus (with small kids) a mid-morning snack and one in the mid-afternoon is important, and IMO you offer slightly more than you expect them to want if not with them, or seconds if you are, and allow them to decide how much and what of what you offer is required. Coaxing to "clean plates" is a bad idea.

I also think automatically offering sugary treats at most main meals and snacks (other than fresh fruit) is a bad idea. Of course treats matter and turning any food into a forbidden object of yearning is counter-productive, but sugar is addictive and it's not great, IMO, to establish an expectation of it coming in processed and cooked form at every meal. Most meals, DS gets fesh fruit - and he loves it because we ensure a wide variety. Sugary puddings are for when we go out or have guests over.

None of that is rocket science, but the middle part seems totally against the attitude at nurseries and schools. They try to get toddlers and young kids to eat in a set order (main - yohurt - fruit) and they try to get them to eat the lot, and then complain if the parent offers a large portion. DS very occasionally eats all his packed lunches; mostly he doesn't finish one area. And he knows what his body is craving and how hungry he is, and IMO he should be left to get on with it, not made anxious about his intake.