The second post in this little Back To School series is going to be about lunch and snack essentials for school. It turned out to be a very happy and colorful post. Just look at those pictures, right? All items featured in this post scream "Food is FUN!". And it is! So eating at school should be fun too. If you missed the first post in the series, I talked about must have homework essentials, so be sure to give that post a read as well. Now on to snacks and lunch.
A school day is a long and very tiring day for your little ones. A little bit like our work days. Learning new things is hard work for sure. To make it through the day and maximize their learning, our kids need a lot of energy, both physically and mentally. And what better way to provide them with energy than healthy and yummie foods? In colorful boxes obviously, like that is even optional. This post is going to be about the best choices of "hardware" to take food and drinks to school, not about what food to bring to school. Maybe I'll do one about that in the future, if you'd like to see that, let me know in the comments below!
A school day is a long and very tiring day for your little ones. A little bit like our work days. Learning new things is hard work for sure. To make it through the day and maximize their learning, our kids need a lot of energy, both physically and mentally. And what better way to provide them with energy than healthy and yummie foods? In colorful boxes obviously, like that is even optional. This post is going to be about the best choices of "hardware" to take food and drinks to school, not about what food to bring to school. Maybe I'll do one about that in the future, if you'd like to see that, let me know in the comments below!
Lunch
The most important part of the day to provide energy-out-of-colorful-boxes is obviously lunchtime. In most schools in Belgium all the lunch boxes of the classroom will be collected into some kind of basket first thing in the morning. This way when someone forgets their lunch at home either the parents can be notified and bring something over or the teacher can find something for the child. A lot of times when this happens other kids are very eager to share their own lunch, little Samaritans. Because all the lunch boxes are thrown in a basket together there are 3 requirements for a good lunch box. It needs to be sturdy, it needs to close very well and it needs to stand out in the crowd of boxes so your child will know which box is his/hers.
Since I do not have children of my own I can't show you examples of lunch boxes with fun designs like Cars, Frozen, Minions, ... but many kids in my class last year had such fun lunch boxes! What I can show you though are my own lunch boxes. They're both see through with a little bit of pink. Not super special but I really like them and they would make great lunch boxes for your kids too.
First up is my Little Lunch Box. This lunch box is a simple rectangular, one compartment box and it came with its own cooling bag and ice pack. I like my one compartment box when I'm bringing a salad, but you can easily put sandwiches in there as well. Putting your lunch box in a bag like this will protect it from scratches and it will surely help it stand out in the basket full of boxes. In the colder months you won't necessarily need the ice pack but in the warmer months you can freeze the ice pack and cool your lunch to keep it fresh until lunchtime. Because the box is a little bit smaller than the bag you can still put a piece of fruit in the bag if you'd like.
Next up is my own personal favorite: the Sistema Klip It Lunch Cube. It's like the name suggest a cube and it has three compartments. One bigger (half of the box) that has its own lid and 2 smaller that don't have a lid. When you close the box the lid of the big compartment also holds the contents of the smaller two in its place. It's really the perfect size. Not too big to carry around (it even fits in my little cooling bag!) but big enough to fit lots of yummie food! I love that there are different compartments so I can take sandwiches, fruit and vegetables in one box without it all getting smashed together. Sistema makes a lot of different boxes, for lunch snacks and much more.
First up is my Little Lunch Box. This lunch box is a simple rectangular, one compartment box and it came with its own cooling bag and ice pack. I like my one compartment box when I'm bringing a salad, but you can easily put sandwiches in there as well. Putting your lunch box in a bag like this will protect it from scratches and it will surely help it stand out in the basket full of boxes. In the colder months you won't necessarily need the ice pack but in the warmer months you can freeze the ice pack and cool your lunch to keep it fresh until lunchtime. Because the box is a little bit smaller than the bag you can still put a piece of fruit in the bag if you'd like.
Next up is my own personal favorite: the Sistema Klip It Lunch Cube. It's like the name suggest a cube and it has three compartments. One bigger (half of the box) that has its own lid and 2 smaller that don't have a lid. When you close the box the lid of the big compartment also holds the contents of the smaller two in its place. It's really the perfect size. Not too big to carry around (it even fits in my little cooling bag!) but big enough to fit lots of yummie food! I love that there are different compartments so I can take sandwiches, fruit and vegetables in one box without it all getting smashed together. Sistema makes a lot of different boxes, for lunch snacks and much more.
Water
Another very important part of a healthy school day is staying hydrated.. with water. Many students in the class where I was a substitute last year brought 3 small cartons of fruit juice to school: one for first break, one for lunch and one for afternoon break. You could say that I'm a strict teacher but I quickly changed the rules about bringing fruit juice to class. Drinking fruit juice throughout the entire day is just too much sugar for children, they'll be super active (not in a good way) and they'll need to put in much more effort to concentrate on learning. I allow one fruit juice at lunch but the rest of the day the children in my class drink water. I allow my students to drink water throughout the whole day when they're thirsty. First graders will need to ask me before they can drink (but they can ask any time), older students can have their own bottle on the table and drink whenever they feel like it.
You can buy little bottles of water in the supermarket but in the long run you'll save lots of money when you invest in a reusable water bottle. Tupperware makes very sturdy and durable bottles. I have two different ones. I have this little penguin. It's a small size bottle that can hold 350ml, perfect for your smaller kids. Mine has a white cap now because there was something wrong with the purple one and there were only white replacement caps. I also have the Tupperware Medium Eco Water Bottle in Guacamole. This a larger size bottle that can hold 750ml. Both the penguin and the other bottle have sports caps to drink from which is good for children. They'll be less likely to spill than with bottles with a normal cap, the opening is quite big on those bottles.
About a month ago I bought another reusable water bottle to try out and I love it even more than I love my Tupperware ones. It's the Brita Fill&Go Filtered Water Bottle in Blue. Why do I love it? Because I know I can fill it up anywhere I want without having to worry about the quality of the water/pipes. I tried it with water that tasted very foul directly from the tab, once filtered it tasted normal. It's a bit pricier and you will need to replace the filter disc after approximately 20l but I think it's really worth it. One of the reasons why I would recommend this bottle for use in class is that when you hold the bottle upside down, not a drip of water comes out so it's completely spill-proof!
You can buy little bottles of water in the supermarket but in the long run you'll save lots of money when you invest in a reusable water bottle. Tupperware makes very sturdy and durable bottles. I have two different ones. I have this little penguin. It's a small size bottle that can hold 350ml, perfect for your smaller kids. Mine has a white cap now because there was something wrong with the purple one and there were only white replacement caps. I also have the Tupperware Medium Eco Water Bottle in Guacamole. This a larger size bottle that can hold 750ml. Both the penguin and the other bottle have sports caps to drink from which is good for children. They'll be less likely to spill than with bottles with a normal cap, the opening is quite big on those bottles.
About a month ago I bought another reusable water bottle to try out and I love it even more than I love my Tupperware ones. It's the Brita Fill&Go Filtered Water Bottle in Blue. Why do I love it? Because I know I can fill it up anywhere I want without having to worry about the quality of the water/pipes. I tried it with water that tasted very foul directly from the tab, once filtered it tasted normal. It's a bit pricier and you will need to replace the filter disc after approximately 20l but I think it's really worth it. One of the reasons why I would recommend this bottle for use in class is that when you hold the bottle upside down, not a drip of water comes out so it's completely spill-proof!
Snacks
For snacks I recommend you have a few different smaller boxes to put fruits, vegetables, nuts or cookies into. I have a pink Tupperware one that I bought in support of breast cancer research a few years ago and I have a blue one that I bought in my local grocery store. The only real difference between the two is that the lid of the Tupperware one is removable while the lid on the blue one clicks shut on one side but is permanently attached on the other side. For smaller children I'd opt for boxes with non removable lids. Why? In most schools the children eat snacks when they're out and about on the playground so they'll be less likely to lose a part of their box when it's all in one piece.
Other very handy boxes are the "fruit shaped" fruit boxes. I added a banana box in the pictures just because it's so happy and yellow. I also think the banana box is the most popular fruit shaped box because you can slice other fruits to fit into a normal snack box but you just can't do that with a banana.
Other very handy boxes are the "fruit shaped" fruit boxes. I added a banana box in the pictures just because it's so happy and yellow. I also think the banana box is the most popular fruit shaped box because you can slice other fruits to fit into a normal snack box but you just can't do that with a banana.
I hope this post helped you have a little insight in school eating habits and what to bring to school for lunch, snacks and drinks. If you have any questions at all (school related or not), don't hesitate to ask in the comments below or talk to me on Twitter @aheartyhome!
love,
Margot
Margot
