A quick survey of what children are eating in their lunches was quite illuminating. Recently I noticed that some children were tired -even in the morning. They seemed to have reasonable bed times and I wondered if the food they were eating might be contributing to the problem. A problem because tired children find learning harder and they can get very scratchy with each other. I know myself that I can get tired and grumpy if I don’t have enough to eat. So while they were eating at their desks I wandered around to see what was what. Some children had well prepared meals including soup and other heat ups which they zapped in our classroom microwave. Most had fruit which was good. However there were a number who had little and what they did have was of the high energy snack type food or the dieting type food crackers and the like. Most children said they made their own lunch so I suspect they threw together what was available and headed out the door.
This week for homework the children have a food project to complete. This includes a little reading about healthy food and a task where they have to monitor the types of food going into their lunches. (See the Homework Grid for this week published in the pages section.) Mrs Harris has kindly donated us a toaster and a kettle to supplement our microwave. I don’t suppose there is an unused sandwich maker out there or even a small fridge?
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An excellent article on children’s lunches can be found at this website: http://www.healthyfood.co.nz/articles/2007/february/back-to-school-how-to-avoid-lunchbox-drama