Earlier in the term our school applied for a grant through the State Government's $10.65 million Food Program Funding . Our school was successful in obtaining $134 000 to provide a fruit snack to each student every day of the week to enjoy during our daily “fruit break.”
Healthy eating, along with physical activity, is essential in maintaining good health and wellbeing and can improve behaviours critical to educational success and participation at school.
Eating breakfast and lunch are important for:
- meeting a child’s daily nutrient needs (including vitamins and minerals) for healthy growth and development
- improving the child’s concentration and attention span, making them ready to learn
- reducing hunger and fatigue which may improve behaviour and mood.
The program will begin on Tuesday 8th October (week 2 of Term 4). From this day till the end of term, parents will not need to provide a healthy snack for their child’s daily “Fruit Break” around 10am. Each day, representatives from each class will collect their fruit pack from fridges on each campus and take back to their room. Students will have their fruit snack at approximately 10am each day, except when specialist lessons or special events occur.
What constitutes appropriate food for daily “Fruit Break”? Any fresh fruit is the obvious answer, and we’ll provide this for your child. If your child is still learning to enjoy fruit, the list below are the only acceptable alternatives.
- Yoghurt in a container (with a spoon) or pouch
- Cheese sticks
- Raw vegetables (carrot sticks, celery, broccolli)
- Nothing processed in a package is acceptable for fruit/brain break. Eg muesli bars, fruit straps, roll ups
If your child will not eat any of the options listed above, I encourage you to reach our to your child’s teacher.
The fruit provided to students will be seasonal fruit including bananas, apples, mandarins & pears. Our fruit will be locally supplied by Misfuds Fresh Fruit Barn via delivery twice weekly. Fruit will be stored in fridges specifically purchased for the program.
For a large scale project such as this, we anticipate there will be fruit leftover each day/week. Some fruit will be edible, and some spoiled. If you know of any local organisations who would benefit from either fruit (edible or spoiled) please let us know as we'd dearly like to reduce waste and model "looking after our environment" to the community.
Many thanks to Mrs Stephens in the office who was instrumental in applying for the Food Program grant and has organised the logistics to turn this program into a reality.