Homework Snacks

As a mom, I know how homework time can be.... we have tried to set up routine, find the right time. I know afterschool my daughter wants some time to "relax" before homework and with soccer, dance, band and other extra curriculars, it is tough to keep on schedule sometimes.

One thing is for certain, that afterschool snack can make whatever the plans are, a little smoother. There are a lot of great posts with after school snack ideas - but this one had some quick and easy, healthy ideas...

As a parent trying to help your children learn, sometimes it's beneficial to look past the books to find other ways to help them succeed. The perks of a healthy diet are widespread and well-known and can also have a substantial impact on how students perform in school. As the old saying goes, we are what we eat, so why not give your kids nourishing, nutritious food? Before parents sit down to help with homework or provide school work help, they should try giving kids brain fuel: healthy snacks that can promote energy, concentration and vitality. Take a look at these great options that all kids will love:

Ants on a log
A more old-fashioned choice, ants on a log has been a favorite simple, friendly snack for generations. It packs protein, fiber, healthy fat and crunch, so kids may not even realize it's healthy. To make ants on a log, spread peanut butter into the crevices of celery stalks and dot the stalk with raisins.

Fruit smoothies
Smoothies are sweet and personalizable, so kids of all ages are sure to find varieties they love. Everything from bananas and strawberries to mangos and oranges go great in smoothies and provide a great base for more unique flavors. Parents can add yogurt or flax seeds for added protein, or even sneak spinach and other leafy greens into the smoothie to trick kids into eating their vegetables.

Hummus
Kids love dipping, and hummus may just become their new favorite! This Mediterranean dip can satisfy a salty craving and goes great with vegetables, pita or crackers. Made primarily from chick peas, hummus is a protein-packed snack that will help keep them going until dinner time.

Mini pizza crackers
Pizza is one of many kids' favorite foods, and in being creative, parents can create healthier snack-sized versions! Top large crackers or mini pitas with sauce and have kids add their own toppings – vegetables or meats should do the trick – before sprinkling with cheese. Place them into the oven for a few minutes until they're golden and bubbly, then your treats are ready to go.

Candied chickpeas
If kids like snacks that are sweet and crunchy, candied chickpeas are a great way to satisfy both cravings. Check out the Northwestern University Spoon's recipe for roasted cinnamon sugar chickpeas that have just the right amount of sweetness.

http://www.pearsonathome.com/parent-enrichment/five-after-school-snacks-to-keep-kids-satisfied-through-homework-time/

Home Ec: Fruit Crisps

I have to say that these fruit crisps look delicious and were delicious.

First terms were a bit messier... (click here) but just as delicious and nutritious to eat.

Teach children to cook... create healthy adults....

Want your children to grow up to be healthy adults? Teach them to cook....


I really enjoyed this article from the Province this week. It talks about involving children in grocery shopping and food preparation and cooking at a young age to help promote healthy eating and lifestyle. I find this to be very true, even more so as I teach Home Ec this year. Learning about the sugars in drinks and the Canada Food Guide and portions tat make a serving of vegetables for example. The article writes:

The occasional lucky person takes to cooking like a duck to water. But for most of us, it's a skill that needs to be taught. And the sooner children start to learn, the easier things tend to go.

"It has implications down the road," says Kate Comeau, a registered dietitian and spokesperson for Dietitians of Canada, the professional body that represents roughly 6,000 dietitians in this country.

"You can learn to cook as an adult ... but if we can start kids earlier, we tend to see healthier adults."

Tasks need to be geared to the child's age and abilities. Tearing lettuce is something a really young child can help with. Once they are able, getting children to read a recipe aloud provides opportunities to explain measurements and cooking terms.

Read article here

Home Ec: Checking In #homeecteacher

Wow, October is half way over, I feel like I am finally getting my head wrapped around the ins and outs or teaching Home Ec again! I meant to post more sooner, but just haven't had the time... but I want to post more! As a new home ec teacher, I am learning so much and want to share it with others who may find themselves teaching home ec, but also to seek ideas from those of you more experienced home ec teachers =)

My job share partner teachers M-W and typically does the recipe and demo with the students along with the lessons. My Thurs and Fri is typically cooking/lab days and on off weeks continuation of the lessons.

We are doing just foods/cooking, not sewing, which I have taught in the past (Sock Monkeys for 6/7s, PJ pants for 8s)

I wanted to share some of the labs we have made. I didn't get photos of the cheese scones, quesadilla, fruit tarts or berry muffins, however, I do have some of our other labs....

Grade 6/7s did fruit crisps... messy but delicious!

Grade 8s did pizza pockets. Dough was Day 1, Stuffing was Day 2

Grade 6/7s made personal/co-operative pizzas

My face says it all... this was my FIRST lab day, It felt so great to see all the students enjoying their muffins!

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins - these were so yummy!

So, although things are VERY busy, they are going very well! I am really enjoying Home Ec and as first term comes to an end in a couple weeks, I feel like second term will be a blast now that I am used to my new position!!

Article: What Teachers Eat For Lunch Matters More Than You’d Think

What Teachers Eat For Lunch Matters More Than You’d Think

by Dawn Casey-Rowe, Social Studies Teacher and Learnist Evangelist

 

Back to school season makes me think about lunch.

“You’re supposed to be thinking about teaching,” you might say. Lunch might not seem like an academic topic, but it is–students who are not well nourished do not learn effectively. While some schools have rejected prepared foods in favor of salad bars, chopped veggies, homemade items, and farm to table, these options simply aren’t available for many of our children. The history of school lunch is interesting. Though the first school lunch was provided in New York City in 1853, lunch programs were expanded during the Depression, feeding children and helping farmers to take price-lowering surplus off the market. This created the the standard school lunch, available at prices students could afford, leading to many hungry children being fed.

Some of the resulting items are not as healthy as we might like in today’s health-conscious environment. The good news is that many schools are addressing this. Still, parents often choose to encourage healthy eating by packing lunch for students, saving money in these tough economic times as well. When I was a student a million years ago, it wasn’t cool to bring a lunch. I ate several years of jelly sandwiches supplanted by several more of soup in thermoses, followed by four years of high school cafeteria lunch.

 

Healthy eating isn’t just an issue for kids–it’s an issue for adults, too, and critical, because we provide the example. Our students and children see how we eat. They emulate us. Healthy lifestyle habits set foundations for success. This is one of the most important issues in school today, in my opinion. I can’t teach effectively to students who haven’t eaten–this happens all the time. As a teacher, I don’t get apples, I toss them to hungry students. Every day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

5 Learnist Resources For Healthier Eating At School

Waste-Free Lunch

The United States generates mountains of waste related to school lunches, and not every school recycles. Reduce the waste using the waste-free lunch philosophy. Packing a waste-free lunch isn’t that hard. You need a few items that will save you money in the end–and they are very cool for school.

School Gardens

School gardens interest students in food. When students, especially little ones, see their food grow–the miracle of watching the seed grow into the food on the table, they become interested in trying new healthy foods. Although I’m still waiting for this to be true for my son, it’s certainly true for my students.

Packing a Healthy School Lunch

Packing healthy lunch doesn’t need to be burdensome. It can be fun, too. This board has suggestions and recipes to help you, so that lunch doesn’t get old quick.

Kids and Healthy Food

This board discusses the issue of kids and healthy food, including the fact that the number one school meal is chicken fingers and french fries–hardly the place we want to be on a regular basis. Healthy school lunches is becoming a large political grassroots movement. How is your state doing?

Healthify Your Lunch

Kids’ habits are generated and reinforced by adults. Here are some ways to make your own lunch great. Whether you are a parent, teacher, or just interested in health, we can all do a little better. Get a new lunch box, plan out the menus, and have fun! Chances are, you’ll be able to keep a little bit more money in your wallet as well.

Source: http://www.teachthought.com/interest/what-teachers-eat-for-lunch-matters-more-than-youd-think/

Make Ahead Lunches.... Great Time Saver

I love this idea. As a mom and as an on-call teacher who sometimes (ok often!) gets a last minute call to go to this school or that, it is nice to have some ready-to-go lunch snacks.

In my house we have a snack bin for dry snacks, granola bars, fruit snacks, yougurt bars, cereal bars, crackers, cookies, etc. I also have one of those bins in my classroom for kids who don't bring lunches or miss breakfast. (Last year I also had a small fridge in my class where I stored yougurt tubes for kids in similar situations)

But I love the idea of having cold snacks and even sandwiches or wraps ready to grab and go at any time.

COLD SNACKS BIN:

String Cheese, Babybel cheese

Yogurt smoothies or other yogurt cups

Carrots ( I found little cups with lids at Cash n Carry that I add ranch dip to them sometimes)

Apples

Sliced Oranges

Mandarin Oranges, whole

Green Peppers, sliced thinly

Celery sticks

Grapes, Cherries, Canteloupe or other seasonal fruit cut up

DRY SNACKS BIN:

Crackers or Pretzels

Homemade Granola

Granola Bars

Beef Jerkey

Trail Mix

Chips

Graham Crackers

Brownies or Homemade Cookies ( I bake up a bunch and individually bag them up)

Special Treats ( usually for a holiday – like a single candy on Halloween…)

Source: http://happymoneysaver.com/cold-lunches-in-a-day/

The obesity era

As the American people got fatter, so did marmosets, vervet monkeys and mice. The problem may be bigger than any of us

Years ago, after a plane trip spent reading Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Notes from the Underground and Weight Watchers magazine, Woody Allen melded the two experiences into a single essay. ‘I am fat,’ it began. ‘I am disgustingly fat. I am the fattest human I know. I have nothing but excess poundage all over my body. My fingers are fat. My wrists are fat. My eyes are fat. (Can you imagine fat eyes?).’ It was 1968, when most of the world’s people were more or less ‘height-weight proportional’ and millions of the rest were starving. Weight Watchers was a new organisation for an exotic new problem. The notion that being fat could spur Russian-novel anguish was good for a laugh.
That, as we used to say during my Californian adolescence, was then. Now, 1968’s joke has become 2013’s truism. For the first time in human history, overweight people outnumber the underfed, and obesity is widespread in wealthy and poor nations alike. The diseases that obesity makes more likely — diabetes, heart ailments, strokes, kidney failure — are rising fast across the world, and the World Health Organisation predicts that they will be the leading causes of death in all countries, even the poorest, within a couple of years.

Read the whole article here: http://www.aeonmagazine.com/being-human/david-berreby-obesity-era/

Enviro-Lunch Kits

I have seen a few of these cool lunch boxes lately while TTOCing in different Primary classes. I like that there are different compartments for food, it makes eating healthy lunches more fun and is environmentally more friendly.

I looked into them some more and found the website for Planetbox. Although they are a bit pricey ($40-60+ depending on what add-on's you get) I can see the savings financially in purchasing them:

Their website says:

Why does your product cost what it does?Most of us are used to the low cost of buying things made out of plastic and designed to be used and thrown away fairly quickly. Our product is different. We use a high quality, expensive material, and our products are intricately engineered to function well over time. All this costs more than the throw away items we are too used to consuming. We realize that this is a significant investment for many families As you know, this is something that you and your child can use every weekday for years to come. It is a high quality product that is not cheap to produce. Our sincere hope is that people will find the investment was worth it for their family.

Even though PlanetBox might cost more up front, will it save me money in the long term?

Yes! By replacing wasteful, single use plastic and paper containers, you will save money over the lifetime of the product. Also, your PlanetBox allows you to buy food in bulk, which is cheaper and less wasteful than single use containers. For example, a 1 oz prepackaged bag of cheesy crackers costs 87 cents, but 1 oz of those exact same crackers taken from a 12 oz box costs 43 cents – half as much!

I plan to look into other lunch kits similar to this and see what is out there first...

 This website has a great comparison of several "bento box" style lunch kits.

Still, thist is absolutely something I would like to get for my daughter's lunches (and mine too!)

Here is their website if you want to check it out:
http://www.planetbox.com/index.html

Here are some more photos from the website:

Action Schools! BC Resources for TTOCs

Action Schools! BC has a lot to offer teachers and some great things for TTOCs who wish to include some Daily Physical Activity or healthy lessons into their days with different classes.

The first cool thing I discovered was that they have established really cool activity Circuits for most schools in BC here. You can click your district, find a school, and load the map of the schools playground/field area for suggested activities/circuits to do with classes.

Besides that, they offer many FREE workshops. At the BCTF New Teacher's Conference, a rep told me they could do one for TTOCs and everyone gets some super handy supplies and lessons they can take with them into the classroom!
Their website has Tons of Resources including downloadable worksheets, handouts, posters, and activities about healthy eating, excersize, and more.

I always love the resources the schools have from Action Schools! BC - but was thrilled to see all the online resources and workshops available for teachers not attached to a school. I hope to book a workshop for our TTOCs next year!