Mystery solved: Breakfast is key!
Author: Tammy Lane • First Posted: Thursday, March 10, 2011
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Southern Elementary is a grab-and-go school with prepackaged breakfasts. Playing off the 'breakfast detectives' theme, the cafeteria staff decorated the food line to encourage more kids to participate.
March 7-11: National School Breakfast Week
Clever kids have clued into breakfast and uncovered the facts about how a nutritious meal can put them on the right trail toward enjoying a productive day. It’s all part of School Breakfast Detectives: The Search for Super Energy.
Each year, the School Nutrition Association celebrates National School Breakfast Week with a different theme. This time, cafeteria lines were decorated with Sherlock Holmes hats, magnifying glasses and tips on making good food choices. Some schools offered nutrition puzzles and a book cover contest as well.
In Fayette County, elementary and middle schools also served themed menus with items like Private-Eye Pancakes with Blueberry Topping, Code-Cracker Cereal and Dried Cranberries, Get-a-Clue Cheese Omelet with Salsa, I-Spy a Sausage Biscuit, and the Case of the Breakfast Scramble.
“We label it little fun things to make it interesting for the kids,” said Patti Collins, cafeteria manager at Southern Elementary. “A lot of times they’re curious when they read the menu. It promotes more participation. That’s the goal – to attract more students who maybe decide they really like to eat breakfast.”
National School Breakfast Week was launched in 1989 to raise awareness of the availability of the school breakfast program. Research has shown that children who eat breakfast have fewer health issues, score higher on tests and even behave better in class.
Kari Reynolds promotes healthy eating and active lifestyles all year long. As a consumer education coordinator working with more than a dozen FCPS schools, she provides classroom programs, staffs health fairs and meets with parents, too.
Twice a month, Reynolds visits with a first-grade class at Southern Elementary, where she leads games like Nutrition Bingo and activity charades and hands out coloring sheets and magnets.
“We talk about creating a healthy menu and the importance of drinking water versus drinking sodas,” she said.
The children have also responded well to taste-test experiments, sampling apple butter and pineapple juice, for instance. As Reynolds told them, “It’s OK if you don’t like a food. Just try two bites to make sure.”
As for the importance of breakfast, she emphasizes such points as:
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It gives the brain energy to think clearly.
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It provides vitamins and nutrients for a healthy body.
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It revs up metabolism and keeps it going strong all day.
“I explain how much better they’d feel and how much more work they’d get done on a full stomach,” said Reynolds, who set up a resource table in the cafeteria at Southern one day during School Breakfast Week.
First-graders Elijah Perkins and Katie Allen have taken the message to heart.
“It’s not good to skip breakfast. You have to get running and going,” noted Katie, who really likes strawberries.
Elijah, a cereal man, agreed: “You just have to get something in your stomach in the morning.”
Resources
Kari Reynolds of PACS NOW, (859) 309-1935
Pennyrile Allied Community Services / Nutritional Outreach & Wholeness (PACS NOW), (800) 264-0643. Its primary focus is promoting nutrition and physical activity. These programs and services, which are available for all age groups, are federally funded through the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
School Nutrition Association, sponsor of National School Breakfast Week