What Is Your Child Really Eating at School?

I was never the type of kid who regularly bought school lunches. They were never really appealing to me and quite frankly, still aren’t. I never really paid any attention to them or gave it much thought until after seeing some of the lunches served to the children at the daycare center I worked at over the summer.

           

Each day the lunch cart came around, it was my job to provide 14 preschoolers with a “well-balanced” plate that included mainly carbs and cheeses and the occasional vegetable and fruit. As an educator, I really wanted to encourage all of my children to at least try everything on their plate. After looking at some of their plates I thought to myself, “How can I tell them to try that if I won’t even eat that?” This made me think that there just has to be a better alternative to school lunches simply because these parents are paying far too much for their children to be eating this garbage. Not to mention, secondly, children should not be consuming this type of food on a regular basis. Period.

Meals like nachos and cheese, pizza, mac n’ cheese, loaded potatoes (you get the idea) offer no nutritional value what so ever for these children. People often have the mindset, “They’re kids, they will run it off.” Except, do we ever stop to think about how this type of food could actually have an effect on their mood, or energy levels? Could this be the reason why they are so tired when they come home from school? Regardless, schools have control over the food they serve to these children.

Children may not be overly thrilled that they don’t have a loaded baked potato on their plate for lunch, but it is also our job to educate them and teach them about healthier options and inform them about this so-called word we always seem to ignore; moderation. I am a firm believer in, “Everything in moderation.” Therefore, we should take a step back and reflect on the meals that these children are consuming on a daily basis. At the end of the day, children should not be eating something on their plate that is almost unrecognizable due to the amount of cheese smothered over it.