During our engagement with schools, we’ve been hearing about some of the issues you’re seeing during lunchtime, such as children not eating, food being wasted, and children not recognising school meals because they are different from those eaten at home. 

We understand your concerns that children are not getting a nutritional school meal and how this affects their behaviour, and their ability to learn and retain information.

To help you overcome this within school we have pulled together some ideas that you might like to try…

Lunchtime Champions

Identify those children who are good eaters and invite them to be Lunchtime Champions. These Champions can informally support others to make the most of the salad bar or provide encouragement by sitting with children who struggle to try new foods. 

Sticker incentives

Who doesn’t love collecting stickers? Work with your lunchtime supervisors to raise their awareness of those children who are not good at trying new foods – then encourage them to smell and taste new things, earning stickers as an incentive. Perhaps a full sticker card could earn them house points. 

Cooking a school meal as a learning experience

Working with your catering team, why not design a cooking lesson where children who find it hard to identify with school lunchtime meals can learn more about them? Being given the opportunity to try the ingredients and cook the meal may increase their enjoyment of the foods on the lunchtime menu. 

If your school is interested in trying one of these ideas, but you’re not sure where to start, please get in touch by emailing us at healthimprovement@telford.gov.uk  

And if your school has a programme that is working to solve this issue and you’d like to share your success story, we’d love to create an article with you to share your good news story with other schools.