trekker Posted October 12, 2013 Posted October 12, 2013 Just a quick question - in a situation where a child / children do not want to eat their snack or lunch in preschool or only eat a small amount of it what happens...anyone have any policy that specifies what to do in this situation - for a one off or regular refusals.? How about if they are staying all day? I, of course, would ask parents about food intake at home so I could look at whether if was an area of need but in general I am of the belief that children will eat what they need if they are hungry and would not insist if they said no after gently encouraging / negotiating "How about this little piece"......I really don't believe in saying "you HAVE to eat this / that ...before you get down" but I am interested in finding out what do others think? 1
klc106 Posted October 12, 2013 Posted October 12, 2013 We try lots of encouragement but if they really don't want anything that is in their lunch box then we let them go and play and make sure we tell parents at home time. However, we don't very often have a child not wanting anything at all- normally their yogurts tempt them to eat something!
Guest Posted October 12, 2013 Posted October 12, 2013 Only mornings, so if children do not want snack then they don't have to. Have to say though mine are all starving at the minute
Guest Posted October 12, 2013 Posted October 12, 2013 We have cooked meals in our setting and if a child doesn't eat their lunch then we make them some toast to put them on until snack time in the afternoon.
finleysmaid Posted October 13, 2013 Posted October 13, 2013 hi Trekker, i have a load of fuss pots at our place at the mo....and a group of parents who pack their lunches with enough to feed an army! We offer lots of encouragement and reward with praise/stickers/activities etc I do not have a specific policy because i could not make it flexible enough to be worth it! I have one or two who will bring in breakfast also. If they dont eat their snack then i don't worry (though they are asked to have a drink of water) Lunches are another thing ....we have various different ways of getting them to eat ...and it's often very personal so my two korean boys like to have a plate in the middle of the table and help themselves (they eat almost the exact opposite of their twin!) some have been spoon fed at home...so need to be taught to get on with it ! for some it's about just learning that if they don't have it then then they don't get anything else (they can have their snack later) but i don't bribe them with eat your sandwich and then you can have your yoghurt sort of thing! Our parents buy our lunch club and it is very popular because we have so much success with children who are fussy we even have a little boy with an eating disorder come and we're beginning to see real improvements! :1b They do need to eat something so it has to be monitored carefully (they can be with us all day) and we talk a lot with parents about suitable lunch contents! (last years were great this years are AWFUL!) 2
mps09 Posted October 13, 2013 Posted October 13, 2013 We are pretty much the same. If a child doesn't want snack then that's fine, but they are still expected to sit at the table with the others for social snack, and encouraged to have a drink. Sometimes at lunch, we have to take out savoury and 'hide' the rest to encourage them to eat, then with negotiation they are encouraged to eat, no-one can leave the table until 3 people have finished, and so sometimes they continue to eat while they are 'waiting'. If they really don't want it though, they can leave the table, get offered it again in the afternoon, then we just discuss with parents, sometimes less is more, and they just need something less daunting... We use these to send home, or put in lunchboxes, either with child didn't like, or child ate well!! lunchtime letter.docx 1
Upsy Daisy Posted October 13, 2013 Posted October 13, 2013 I am firmly of the belief that it is the adults' job to make food available and children's job to decide whether to eat it.I've clashed with other practitioners and my daughter's school over this principle but I've also had plenty of children who will eat a hearty meal in my care and refuse the same food point blank at home. I make it a rule never to encourage a child to eat. Some children might try to engage in a battle but that takes two and I won't. If a child decides not to eat at a mealtime a healthy snack or some of the same can be made available a bit later. There can be all sorts of reasons why a child chooses not to eat and, unless they have some sort of developmental disorder, they are not going to starve themselves.I'd hate to be put under pressure to eat when I don't want to and I don't want to do it to anyone else. 3
finleysmaid Posted October 13, 2013 Posted October 13, 2013 i do understannd where you are coming from upsy daisy...this again comes down to us knowing the children and families in our care and their needs. I am very careful about how i handle this as i too have had issues with schools in the past. <_< 1
mps09 Posted October 13, 2013 Posted October 13, 2013 I agree totally with Upsy Daisy and Finleysmaid.... my only thought though is when faced with a lunchbox full of cheese sandwich, bag of crisps and a wagon wheel, I know which one I'd go for first!! 1
Upsy Daisy Posted October 13, 2013 Posted October 13, 2013 I agree totally with Upsy Daisy and Finleysmaid.... my only thought though is when faced with a lunchbox full of cheese sandwich, bag of crisps and a wagon wheel, I know which one I'd go for first!! I'd allow the child to eat whichever they liked and send the rest home. Then I'd have a conversation with the parents about what their child is eating and suggest just one much smaller treat. Then, if the child chooses to eat the treat first, there is no problem. They will still have room for the rest. I would also be working with the children to help them understand about making healthy choices, praising those who ate more of the healthy foods from the selection they had. This equips the child to make better choices for themselves in the future in a way which withholding certain items doesn't. Those whose parents send the least appropriate foods are the ones who need most to learn to make healthier choices independently. Of course I'm not talking about pre-schoolers, not infants here. They need to be old enough to understand. I have had the most depressing lunches sent for babies and toddlers and in those cases have had to select the most appropriate food and send the rest back. I haven't often had success with educating those parents.
trekker Posted October 13, 2013 Author Posted October 13, 2013 Thank you all for your replies....I am glad I am not alone. I too have clashed with other practitioners over this and some parents put the pressure on too ... just wanted some reassurance - will continue to take a stand :-) 2
trekker Posted December 30, 2013 Author Posted December 30, 2013 Hi - just wanted to follow this up as I am still having issues with staff insisting children eat either 'all their sandwiches' first or withholding what a child does want / ask for (eg a yoghurt ...) and insisting they eat something else first... Just before the holidays I returnedfrom my lunch break to find a child sitting at the table well after others had 'finished' - had been there about 45 to 50 mins I'd guess...(this child would definitely not choose to remain seated that long so obviously was not still there by choice) ...and who was still being told they had to eat their sandwich when they clearly did not WANT them. What made it more ridiculous was the child goes home after lunch anyway... I have already spoken to staff about taking a more relaxed stance at lunch and I have successfully modelled managing fussy eaters because I too believe it is a dangerous path to take to enforce eating and to make it stressful! However staff all seem to think they know better and that I am some mad woman who is basically doing a bad job of this as I am just letting the children 'get away with it' - a phrase I hear often when discussing children who don't eat well. When I am not in the room (but often in hearing distance - this is how I know!) I know they ignore everything I said and lunch time becomes a chore and at times I'd even say, a battle ground with some children. I am very concerned about a lot of this practice - so much so I want to take certain staff off the lunch rota entirely ... but I do want to help thing improve by doing a session on food and managing lunch times for our upcoming INSET day... so my main question is does anyone have any tried and tested ideas for practical staff INSET activities around this subject or ideas about getting the 'easy does it' message across once and for all?
catma Posted December 30, 2013 Posted December 30, 2013 Take in a load of food they would never eat and make them sit there until it's all gone??? I'm thinking sushi or carpaccio of tuna?? Otherwise, not much help I'm afraid!! Cx 2
lashes2508 Posted December 30, 2013 Posted December 30, 2013 A child may need to see a food up to 15 times before even trying it, we encourage our children to try with the emphasis of ' if you don't like it no problem , but you don' t know til you try it but we never force it, we encourage parents to put in a savoury item of their choice as some children don't like bread and we do encourage savoury followed by sweet . But this is part of our healthy eating policy , we have many children who eat things at preschool they would not at home and yes we have lunch boxes filled with enough to feed an army.i feel our meal times are a sociable time and an opportunity for talk , trying new things and learning good manners not an exercise or force feeding opportunity. We take into account the things children do enjoy for snack , top choices are cheese and crackers, soup and humus with toast or cucumber 2
finleysmaid Posted December 30, 2013 Posted December 30, 2013 (edited) http://www.mummymusingsandmayhem.com/2012/11/15-strategies-to-encourage-spd-toddlers.html this was an interesting article...could be the basis for a training session...take a pretend child with spd " how would you plan for their lunch session?" Edited December 30, 2013 by finleysmaid
trekker Posted December 31, 2013 Author Posted December 31, 2013 Thank you for these suggestions...now to plan!
HappyMaz Posted January 2, 2014 Posted January 2, 2014 Take in a load of food they would never eat and make them sit there until it's all gone??? I'm thinking sushi or carpaccio of tuna?? Otherwise, not much help I'm afraid!! Cx I went on a training course with the Local Authority years ago where we were 'treated' to a snack time routine pretty much like the one you describe, catma and it changed the way I looked at snack time forever! I also remember watching a parenting course video where the roles of parent and child were both played by adults - watching an adult being shouted at for not eating their yoghurt quickly enough or for making a mess was a brilliant way of making the point that you wouldn't treat an adult like that, so why would you adopt that approach with your children? Oh what fun you could have at a staff meeting with this concept, trekker! 2
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