<p>For a while now, I’ve had a theory that children with a parent who makes their lunch do better in school than kids who buy lunch or make their own. My D has always been one of those kids with the “healthy” lunch. You know, the kid the other kids feel sorry for. The one without the highly processed foods in horribly wasteful packaging. Smoothie, carrots, apples and peanut butter, crackers and hummus, leftover chicken, etc… I usually pack enough for her to share with her friends who don’t bring a lunch.
As summer comes to an end and I face another 9 months of self-imposed lunch making, I was wondering what you all think. Do you make your kids’ lunch? If so, why? If not, why not?</p>
<p>S2 usually gets leftovers. One day we sent a bag full of junk food. Why I can’t remember but S2 did not eat it because he thought it couldn’t be his if it had all that good stuff in it. haha.</p>
<p>Don’t know if I would classify S2 as doing well in school, though. He does pretty well without doing homework. Does that count?</p>
<p>I make my daughters lunch, mostly because she doesn’t like most of the schools food. I am not sure that it makes a difference as far as how well she does, but you raise a good question.</p>
<p>I always threw out my Moms healthy lunches and went out to lunch with my friends…not to mcdonalds but to the Peruvian chicken place, or the lebanese cafe for shwarma, or to the family run pizza place. all sorta healthy…but facing those carrot sticks every day eeeewwwwhhhhh…no offense mom …and going out is such a social thing…you can talk to a cool girl over a chicken leg where you couldn’t talk to her at school…remember???..luckily there are a million small independent restaurants near my school and we can leave our teeny campus for lunch.</p>
<p>ok sorry i wasn’t clear about my message here… sometimes its not about the food…</p>
<p>I hated school lunch so much as a kid I did not want to subject her to having to eat it so I made school lunch everyday from K-4. What I found out in later years she was swapping half of the stuff in the lunch box. For 5 years I did not know that the kid did not eat raisins but I was constantly packing them in the lunchbox.</p>
<p>When they got to 5th grade, they were allowed to go out to lunch 3 days a week as they were preparing you for middle school. </p>
<p>As Spiker stated, some times it was not about the food as it was probably social suicide if you did not go out to lunch.</p>
<p>Middle school thru 12th grade D went out to lunch with friends(never packed a lunch during these years). The school set parameters regarding how far they could travel but the majority of the kids went to Chelsea Market (one stop shopping).</p>
<p>Don’t know if anyone saw this in the states but Jamie Oliver ran a TV program trying to improve school lunches in the UK. <a href=“All Shows | The UK's biggest free streaming site | Channel 4”>All Shows | The UK's biggest free streaming site | Channel 4;
The results were pretty amazing–<a href=“http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/article/ds23367.html”>http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/article/ds23367.html</a>.</p>
<p>His demonstration of chicken nugget recipe was downright revolting but it did make UK kids turn away from nuggets in such numbers that UK nugget factories had to lay off workers and the UK governemtn increased funding to provide healthy fresh lunches.</p>
<p>I made them till HS, when I figured there was a bit more lunch room choice for them. In elementary school, our schools didn’t real cafeterias, so the school lunches were boxed lunches brought in. Yucch. Wouldn’t subject the kids to that.</p>
<p>My mom stopped packing my lunch in 3rd grade and taught me how to do it myself. She said that it wasn’t hard, and all I needed was a sandwich, a drink, fruit, vegetable, and a treat. Looking back, it’s just one of the many things she did to make me self-sufficient. I always thought she was just being mean when she made me go by myself to have my car inspected, or set up my own bank account, or file my financial aid forms, but I’m glad she did it. It’s amazing how many of my friends don’t even know how to make pancakes from a mix, much less how to clean up glass when it gets broken. My mom taught me how to do just about everything myself, and now that I’m leaving home, it seems like the kindest thing she could have done.</p>
<p>That’s not to say that there’s any disservice in packing your kid’s lunch for them, unless the idea is taken too far and applied to other aspects of life- unfortunately, around here that happens a lot.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure my kids don’t want me packing their lunch - or doing any cooking for them, LOL!! (I call myself the world’s worst cook). But I stopped packing lunches at junior high. Like elizabeth22’s mom, I figured slapping two pieces of bologna between two pieces of bread (my kids preferred choice), tossing in a juice box, and a bag of some sort of treat wasn’t a hard thing to do and they could do it themselves.</p>
<p>I make my kids do all sorts of things - get the checking account, make arrangements to get the cars in for maintenance, etc. I recently got my 16 year old son a credit card attached to our account (mainly because he travels to golf tournaments over an hour away and I wanted him to have it in case of an emergency). I made him call and activate it (and we all know that’s not a very tough thing to do) but he kept putting it off because he thought he’d have to talk to someone on the phone to do it. But seeing as how that’s how he was going to buy gas for his car and it was on empty and it was do or die time, he finally made the call.</p>
<p>A simple thing? Yes. But next time, he knows how to do it. I figure anything they can do on their own that teaches them how to be independent, then they have to do it.</p>
<p>Lunches included.</p>
<p>I must admit I am a compulsive lunch maker. When they were little I included notes or stories. With Ss’ stories used the week’s spelling words, both boys are horrendous spellers. I made oldest S’s lunches this summer for him to take to work. I’ve thought about writing an autobiography framed around the number and types of lunches I make. My nurturing is seriously tied to food. It has been ever since I wasn’t ready to go into labor until I had a month of meals in the freezer.</p>
<p>Yes, when they were children I made their lunches.</p>
<p>I always made/make my kids lunches. D is going to be in 10th grade. Lunch consists of fruit, water, a snacky thing like crackers and usually a salad (sometimes the prepared ones)
Other times cheese and crackers or PB crackers and fruit, water.
She sometimes takes an enchillada we make in microwave and wrap in foil to keep warm.
Older D. is in college…though I dont make her lunch anymore I sent her back to school with hard cooked eggs, oatmeal packets, cheese wedges, apples, etc.
She is a very healthy eater. Both of my gals drink mostly water and the occasional glass of juice, milk or tea. One also drinks coffee and ice tea sometimes.</p>
<p>thank you for making me feel better-so he did better because I made his lunch. I hate making lunches but he hated the school food. In middle school he liked the menu but the school was so crowded he went w/o lunch the first day-ran out of time standing in line. From then on I made a lunch. Continued through the crowded HS years. I remember the sadness when I packed the last lunch, all those yrs wishing he could buy something easily and then when it was time to give it up-teary eyes. I did lots of wraps, left over pizza, and tried more to be creative than healthy. Son eats healthy anyway.<br>
Son had learned how to do lots of stuff I never got around to teaching-laundry, folding clothes, cooking. When son has been home alone he learned to feed himself. He does best w/leftovers. Too bad the store doesn’t sell mom’s leftovers.</p>
<p>I always have made my kids lunches-mostly because they hated the school lunch (except for spicy chicken sandwhich, which for some reason is a favorite among the kids)) and in our high school, kids can take electives rather than a lunch period. Teachers allow kids to eat in class (except a chem or bio lab) so a bag lunch is easy. My S’s like either a bagel or turkey sandwhich, water and a snack. As a matter of fact, they both did pretty well in school so maybe there is a correlation. This past June my S did a statistics project for his AP Stat class to see if there was a correlation between eating breakfast and doing better on the SATs and sure enough, those kids who ate a healthy breakfast, did better-it was statiscally significant so maybe good food does make a difference!!</p>
<p>I have always made a healthy lunch for my S every day. But my D insists on buying the school lunch, soggy fries and all. Nevertheless, she is the much better student. Go figure.</p>
<p>I’ve always made my 3 S’s lunches; occasionally they would buy the school lunch. But I kept the bagged lunches simple and somewhat healthy – lean deli meat, bagel, cookies. One S was diabetic so it was important at least in the beginning of his diagnosis that he stick to his meal plan. Now as a college student on his own and with an insulin pump he eats junk – drives me crazy. Other one on his own eats pretty health esp cuz girlfriend is a vegetarian. One at home eats on the run and with friends – not as healthy as I’d prefer.</p>
<p>No. Never did. Not since pre-school. </p>
<p>They either buy at school or pack their own.</p>
<p>Top 10 reasons: </p>
<ol>
<li><p>When I was a kid I used to just throw away everything my mom packed that I didn’t like. I assume my kids would have done the same. </p></li>
<li><p>They always complain about whatever I prepare anyway - at least if they prepare their own, I don’t get blamed for the fact that the sandwich got smushed.</p></li>
<li><p>I am strongly opposed to the practice of cutting crusts off of bread when making PBJ sandwiches. Nonetheless, my d. insisted that this be done. Hence, rather than undergo the humiliation of being forced to trim away crusts, d. must make her own lunch.</p></li>
<li><p>I have always felt that the proper way to make a PBJ sandwich was peanut butter on one side, jelly on the other. Kid like PB spread on both sides, jelly in the middle. Yuuck! See #3 above.</p></li>
<li><p>D. likes those frozen pre-made PBJ things. Double Yuck! </p></li>
<li><p>If not PBJ, it would be tuna. Turns out that the mercury content in tuna is enough to turn kids’ brain to mush. So much for the “kids do better” theory. Better the school poisons them than me. </p></li>
<li><p>When my son was in pre-school, he wanted 7-11 bean & cheese burritos. Every day. He ate them for breakfast, lunch, & dinner. They thawed out nicely when packed in the morning… but geez, that was disgusting. </p></li>
<li><p>Ever notice how bad the inside of a plastic lunch box smells? Especially when the kid forgets to bring it home for 4 days. Who wants to clean that up?</p></li>
<li><p>OK, I admit it, I’m lazy. Plus I have always worked full time and when the kids were small it was a major undertaking just to get everyone out of the house and into the car to get to school/work on time. Breakfast was generally cheerios in a plastic baggie in the car. Lunch on top of that? Much easier to pre-pay the school meal plan… </p></li>
<li><p>Now that d. is in high school, she’s going out to lunch every day with Spiker. Yumm. Hey, what’s the point of going to school in the city if you don’t get to eat out a lot? </p></li>
</ol>
<p>My kids did fine in school. I think that’s because I breast fed them so long when they were babies. ;)</p>
<p>My kids are huge eaters, though extremely lean, youngest has like 4% body fat. They couldn’t afford to buy enough or sacrifice the eating time to spend time in line. Lunch was always a sandwich, deli meat or pb & j, fruit, veggies, milk (bought at school in elementary skipped after that) and then starting in jr high chips, cookies and string cheese. Eldest son in jr high actually took 2 sandwiches, 3 apples, 3 oranges and 3 bananas every day. Packing the lunch bag (he refused to have anything larger than a large lunch bagh) took all of may spatial talents. In HS kids have always kept food in their lockers, dried fruit, graham crackers, granola bars etc. With after school practices they couldn’t manage without something extra. Wish I had their metabolisms.</p>
<p>I kept lots of breakfast bars, fruit, yogurt, plastic spoons, candy, 1/2 subs (intentional leftovers) all in or next to frig. S just grabbed. I use to do the bagel sandwiches, but they’d come home uneaten.
Lunch lines are far too long for anyone. Seems kids just shared whatever they brought with them.
don’t know if improved much in college. I believe they look at microwaving stuff as work, and probably don’t know how to turn on a stove</p>