Now that I’m back from vacation and inspired by all the great food we ate on the east coast, I wanted to experiment with baking vegan bread. The first loaf I made actually turned out pretty well, except the pan was too small. The top crust created an overhang that resembled a breaded version of what you might see at the Grand Canyon. So I went to Target to buy myself a bigger bread pan. Most people in Target that day were not buying bread pans.
The school supply area was overflowing, just like my bread dough. I saw lots of kids with their school supply lists, emphatically lobbying for every item. A few of the teenage girls I saw with their tired moms seemed to be among the most successful at getting what they wanted. When I walked past the lunchbox aisle, I thought of Seed kids who bring their lunches each day. Then I thought of what goes inside the lunchbox and our school website devoted to nutrition came to mind (seedfood.awakeningseedschool.org).
Although we have another week before students come back to school, I’m guessing many of you are starting to think about your children’s lunches. I wanted to tell you about a great resource Awakening Seed provides. About five years ago the teachers met to talk about lunch practices at the Seed. As a starting point, we used an article about developmentally appropriate food practices with children (http://www.naeyc.org/files/naeyc/Eliassen_0.pdf). As we talked about our food policies and practices, we realized how many excellent resources we had to share with parents. What started off as a single conversation ended up as our own seedfood site.
The site includes the Seed nutrition philosophy, lunch ideas, portion size, resources for where to purchase kid-friendly reusable containers, curriculum ideas, and the food policy as it relates to each age group. It also has a blog with posts from parents, teachers, and nutrition specialists. The seedfood site is a living resource for ideas, questions, and general information about nutrition and young children. I invite you to visit the site and if you have ideas to share, please let me know. Also, stay tuned for more information about our school-wide nutrition study the first two weeks of September. Here’s to a happy and nutritious new school year for our Seed kids and all children.
seedfood website: seedfood.awakeningseedschool.org