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Ideas For Your School

Trying to build a culture of health at your school? M&T Nutrition has you covered. Try out our strategies to enact school-wide changes to benefit your students' health today!

School Wellness Policies

School wellness policies are a great way to promote wellness and address the current health issues facing students and staff. ​Each local education agency that participates in the federal Child Nutrition Programs, including the National School Lunch Program or the School Breakfast Program are required to develop and implement a wellness policy. Wellness policies can address policies and practices for before, during and after school. 

 

Many policies are written at the district level, however, consider creating school-specific policies to set goals for nutrition promotion and education, physical activity and other school-based activities that promote student wellness. Ensure your policy fits within the policy of your local district!

 

Assess the relationship between your wellness policies and your school-level health using the Wellness Policy in Action Tool (WPAT) located on the CDC Healthy Schools website and linked here. This information can help your school:

  • Identify where implementation plans are needed to ensure practices are consisten with your policies

  • Share practices that can be incorporated into your district wellness policies

  • Identify opportunities for new nutrition and physical activity practices to work on as a school

Did You Know?

The first week of August is National Farmers' Market Week!

School Nutrition Field Trips

Students can learn about nutrition related topics through traditional away-from-school field trips, in-school field trips or virtual field trips.

 

Away-from-school field trips allow you to take students to places that food is grown or manufactured. Local farms, farmers markets and even grocery stores can make great field trip locations!

 

In-school field trips are provided by an outside company that can customize activities and lessons to fit each grade level.

 

Virtual field trips let educators take students to places without ever leaving the classroom. No permission slips required! Some possible virtual nutrition field trips include:

 

School Gardens

Build a school garden or utilize garden activities to teach children about how their foods grow. School garden programs have been shown in a variety of research studies to help increase students' nutrition knowledge, willingness to try new fruits and vegetables and to help promote positive attitudes about fruits and vegetables. 

 

Schools can incorporate window sill gardens, raised garden beds or planted fields to teach children about gardening. 

 

Students can use gardens to learn about math, science, history and language. They can prepare the soil, plant seeds and help with harvest. Foods from school gardens can be used in the cafeteria, as part of taste tests and can even be sent home with students to promote family fruit and vegetable intake! 

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School Nutrition Messaging

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that schools consider adding nutrition and health related messages to:

  • Morning announcements

  • School assemblies

  • Materials sent home to parents/guardians

  • Staff meetings

  • Parent-teacher meetings

  • School clubs

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