Welcome to the April issue of the secondary newsletter intended especially for teachers and pupils. Please pass on any ideas or information that you find useful to parents and carers too.

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Schools have a vital role to play in promoting healthier food choices to ensure that the nation’s young people are equipped with the knowledge they need to live healthy lifestyles. The most obvious way in which schools can influence their students’ eating habits is through the school dinner. By eating healthy school meals, students will not only be healthier and benefit from improved levels of concentration, they will also hopefully acquire a lasting preference for healthier food options.

The food based guidelines already introduced into schools require that healthy foods and food types such as vegetables and protein are served more often and that foods high in fat and empty calories are restricted. From September 2009, secondary schools will also have to meet the Government’s nutrient based standards for school lunches, which require that minimum levels of key nutrients such as iron and calcium are provided.

Any improvements to school meals can only be positive. However, it may take time to change the eating habits of children who are used to eating a diet consisting largely of processed foods. By giving children the opportunity to try new foods, though, and by backing this up with a whole school approach to food and health, it is hoped that the nation’s children will grow up with a healthier approach to eating.

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Potatoes on the menu

British Potato Council (BPC) has produced a new recipe guide to inspire school caterers across Britain to include potatoes in nutritionally balanced meals that children will eat and enjoy. The BPC guide features a mixture of tasty, new recipes alongside some more familiar dishes, all of which will form part of a healthy balanced diet and have strong appeal to school children, as well as offering great value for money for schools. The ten potato based recipes have been approved by the British Nutrition Foundation and can be used as part of a day-to-day meal service or as the central focus of a themed ‘Potato Day’. Printed copies of the recipe guide are available on request from BPC marketing, along with the ‘Guide to holding a Potato Day’ and the ’Guide to setting up a Jacket Potato Bar’, by calling 01865 714455 or emailing [email protected]. All three packs are also available to request via the BPC’s website: www.potatoesforcaterers.co.uk

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To incorporate the theme ‘Healthy school food’ into the curriculum, try out these lesson ideas.

  • Ask students to plan school lunch menus for a two week period. Initially, you could ask them to devise a menu containing the meals they would like to eat. They could then adapt this menu to make it more balanced and healthy, perhaps using the food-based guidelines for school meals (see the School Food Trust website). What are the main differences between the two menus? They could then choose one of their meal suggestions to cook as part of a D&T; Food technology lesson.
  • As part of an English lesson, students could think of tempting names for each of their healthy school menu dishes and write a description of each dish using persuasive writing. What words could they use to encourage students to choose their dishes?
  • Students could also find out about the special types of diets that are followed by different sports people, such as professional footballers or marathon runners (see www.eatwell.gov.uk/healthydiet/foodforsport for further information). They could then plan healthy seven day menus for a particular sports person.
  • You could also link this work to a PE lesson in order to see if diet does have an impact on sports performance. Record the times achieved by students in a sports activity such as cross country. Then ask students to follow as closely as possible for one week the diet they devised for their particular sports person. Repeat the activity and again record the students’ results. Are there any significant improvements in performance?

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Can you find the real Shaun?

Children up to the age of 12 are being encouraged to get out into the countryside this spring and see if they can find the real Shaun the Sheep. Photographs of Shaun look-a-likes can be entered into the ‘Find the Real Shaun’ competition by the 8th June 2008, at www.yearoffoodandfarming.org.uk. For the best Shaun the Sheep look-a-like, there is a chance to win an exclusive framed still from the Shaun the Sheep series, signed by the director, and a free family ticket to visit a national farm attraction. For all the details visit www.yearoffoodandfarming.org.uk

Sainsbury’s Active Kids Get Cooking 2008

There’s just one month left to get in your entries for the Active Kids Get Cooking competition 2008. This fantastic competition, which encourages and celebrates cooking, offers children the chance to win cash prizes for their schools. Prizes are given to primary and secondary winners in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Entries from special schools are welcomed. The final date for entries is 23rd May. All the details can be found at: www.activekidsgetcooking.org.uk

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New food and farming website

To celebrate the Year of Food and Farming, an interactive website – www.yoffse.org.uk – has been funded by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA). The new ‘food and farming portal’ will help teachers find curriculum resources, ideas for cooking and growing projects plus a wealth of links to other online resources. A seasonality chart helps users understand what’s in season throughout the year. Parents and teachers can then use the site’s interactive map to find more than 80 accredited farms that welcome visiting schools. Also mapped are more than 400 food producers, farm shops, farmers’ markets and Pick Your Own sites. Food or farming-related events in towns, cities and the countryside are listed too. This valuable online resource is linked to the national site for The Year of Food and Farming www.yearoffoodandfarming.org.uk

Garden Organic resources

Garden Organic for Schools – sponsored by Duchy Originals – is a nationwide campaign that helps children to grow fruit and vegetables at school and learn more about their food. Thousands of schools are taking advantage of this free resource. Members receive personal practical gardening advice, curriculum-based resources, a telephone helpline, Heritage seeds, an annual competition, Garden Organics members’ experiments and much more. Schools can also visit Garden Organic Ryton, West Midlands, to inspire children and teachers to grow their own produce in school. In addition, the Garden Organic interactive educational display, The Vegetable Kingdom, is a quirky and informative tool for helping young people to learn more about fruit and vegetables. To find out more about what Garden Organic has to offer schools, call the education team on 024 7630 8238 or visit www.gardenorganic.org.uk/schools

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Get real!

The School Food Trust has launched a new campaign aimed at teenagers. The campaign, called ‘Get real’, will involve several phases and integrate online technology, posters, direct marketing and other methods to convince teenagers of the need to eat healthily. It has been designed to be hard hitting in order to communicate effectively to teenagers the truth about food and healthy eating. Phase one of the campaign concentrates on fast foods and some of the less appealing things that have been found in these kinds of products. It is intended that future phases will focus more explicitly on the advantages of school food and the need for a healthy, balanced diet.

Source: www.schoolfoodtrust.org.uk

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Schools have been telling us about some of the projects that they have set up as part of the Year of Food and Farming. Here’s a selection:

Shenley Court School

Students from Year 7 recently visited a local teaching farm, Chapmans Hill School Farm. They were taken to the farm in their form groups and learnt about organic traditional farming methods. During the visit they fed hens, collected eggs and discovered how chickens feed by using grit in their crops to grind up the food. They also saw how eggs form and felt how warm they are to the touch. The students rubbed the pigs’ bristles, were licked by cows and buried their hands in the sheep’s wool to feel how warm and greasy it is. The day was packed with hands-on experience and learning but was also lots of fun!

www.yearoffoodandfarming.org.uk/spaces/shenley-court-school/School

Hadlow College

Hadlow College offers Further and Higher Education in a range of land-based courses including Agriculture and Machinery, Animal Care, Countryside and Fisheries, Equine, Horticulture, Landscape Management, Sustainability, Garden Design and Floristry. Excellent facilities include specialist machinery workshops, an animal care unit, equine centre, commercial dairy farm and nursery. Hadlow also hosts a fishery, hatchery, ponds and access to the two largest reservoirs in the South East, as well as a specialist design studio, landscape training unit, florist studio and shop, medicinal gardens, garden centre and Broadview Gardens and Tearooms, both open to the public. As part of the Year of Food and Farming, the College is offering local schools the opportunity to come and visit the farm and dairy.

www.yearoffoodandfarming.org.uk/spaces/hadlow-college/General

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Carrots are harvested in Britain almost all year round. Each year 22 billion carrot seeds are sown in Britain, producing around 100 carrots per year for every member of the population.

Source: www.britishcarrots.co.uk

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