Food and Health

We encourage the school and community to recognise the important connection between a healthy diet and a student’s ability to learn effectively and achieve high standards in school. We are a healthy school and actively encourage all pupils to be active and have a healthy diet.  We also encourage pupils to drink plenty of water throughout the day.  We are launching a new Health Eating policy in September 2023 to further improve this aspect of our school.

Snacks

Foundation Stage provide snack for their pupils during the morning session. A charge is made to parents towards the cost of snack provision.

Key Stage 1 and 2 Pupils bring in their own snack of fresh fruit and/or vegetables and water. No juices or other snack items are acceptable, unless a child has significant medical needs.

Lunch

We encourage pupils to eat healthy food, e.g. fruit, cheese, raw vegetables.  Lunch may consist of a sandwich or similar, fruit and or yoghurt, small biscuit or cake and a soft (non-fizzy) drink, such as water, milk or fruit juice. Please ensure your child’s lunch/snack box and water bottles are named.

For health reasons, we discourage too much heavily processed food and ask parents to limit ‘treat’ foods like crisps and pastries, and sweet treats like cakes, chocolate bars and biscuits.  We recommend only one such item is included per day as a maximum- and ideally only rarely.

Nuts in any form are not permitted in school as a number of pupils and staff have severe allergies. We also need to be mindful of the other 14 most common allergens that can cause anaphylactic reactions, and we will update you if there is a need to raise awareness of any of these in your child’s class.  Here is a useful link with more information: https://www.anaphylaxis.org.uk/about-anaphylaxis/14-major-food-allergens/

Birthdays and other Special Events

In order to celebrate children’s birthdays, we allow children to celebrate their individualism by wearing their own clothes.  We do not encourage children to bring in sweets or cakes to give out to the class.  However, if parents wish to send in a fresh fruit snack to give out, they would be welcome.  If you are unsure about this, please talk to your child’s class teacher.

Water

All pupils have access to drinking water in their own water bottles in the classrooms.

What can you do to help?

A good breakfast in the morning before pupils come to school is an extremely important aspect of healthy nutrition and diet for your children.  High quality sleep is very important too which is aided by having time before bed away from electronic screens.