Reinforcing Children's Food Habits in the Schools

When the children you know head off to school for the day, what messages about food do you want them to get? Will the healthy habits parents have practiced and enforced at home eventually give way to pounds of candy, a regular flow of pop, and lunches of nutritional fluff? What will children learn from their peers and from advertising gimmicks? What difference will the school curriculum make?

Most co-op shoppers with children in their lives have thought about this quite a bit, and have taken proactive measures: carefully planning packed lunches, lobbying for healthy snacks in school, keeping advertising away from our kids whenever possible, even choosing schools that offer quality lunches. For some, this is yet another reason to choose to home school.

There is good news in this regard, at least at the elementary level. Many teachers go out of their way to ensure healthy snacks in school. Health units come up at some point during the year, and though not extensive, they do tend to stress grains and fruits and vegetables. In some school districts, a bit of progress has been made in improving the school lunches.

Some area co-ops, the Wedge included, also feel they can help with this issue - either to reinforce what kids are learning at home, or to introduce children to a new way of making food choices. Together with Lakewinds Natural Foods and Linden Hills Co-op, the Wedge funds a non-profit organization called the Midwest Food Connection. This organization goes into classrooms around Minneapolis and Minnetonka and teaches children face-to-face about natural and healthful foods.

The Midwest Food Connection is able to employ one trained and certified elementary school teacher - the future may hold a team of teachers covering the Metro area. What we currently lack in staff we make up with energy and efficiency. Most days of the school year I am in a school near a food co-op, teaching about (as I say to the kids), "how food grows, healthy ways of eating your food, and healthy ways to prepare food."

The food pyramid is fine, and I am always glad to see schools push grains, vegetables, and fruits. But I teach beyond the food pyramid, exploring concepts largely absent from curricula, though probably not from your dinner table. I want kids to learn about their local food system, such as it is, about food options that are minimally processed, and about the connection between what we eat and the plants in the garden and field. With song, role-play, stories, tasting, sketching, and tactile encounters, I bring children to interact with natural foods.

I don't simply add sugar or salt to make foods palatable to little mouths, nor do I trivialize quality products with "fun" activities like carrot-wheel cars, but I continually get great response. Again last week a teacher came to me in surprise that her autistic child, who will hardly eat anything at school, eagerly tried the food samples included in my lesson. Fresh cranberries were a hit this fall - a mouthful of sourness, yet a joy and an experience to remember.

There is still much to worry about as your child maneuvers her way through the world of General Mills and Sprite. Perhaps someday there will even be a marked improvement in the quality of school lunches. But for now you can at least count on a couple of times each year when your child can get an exciting and memorable food experience at school, one that strengthens the values you have at home.

Uli Koester is the teacher for the Midwest Food Connection. If you would like him to teach at your child's school, please leave a message at the Wedge at 612-871-0371, voicemail 345.