The document highlights various ways classrooms are promoting healthy living and eating among children, including healthy snacks, structured meal plans, and physical activities. It shares specific examples from parents and teachers about implementing healthy food choices and engaging students in learning about nutrition. Overall, the aim is to instill good eating habits and encourage physical activity in a supportive educational environment.

1. We think all children should learn what it means to live a healthy life so we asked our Snikiddy Fans to share with us how their classrooms are staying healthy. We had a lot of great responses, so we thought we would share a few. Hopefully these are ideas that can be implemented into your child’s classroom!<br />Talk about healthy choices. Have healthy snacks and lunches and do projects in the classroom where the conversation is on healthy snacks and food. – Kim<br />My child’s classroom does not allow students to bring in cake, etc. for the birthday. Instead, they get a card from the principal and a special certificate and pencil. Also, there are only two parties per year- Halloween and Valentines and we usually try to include some healthy <br />items at these parties so they are not just sugar! – Chris<br />My child’s class does carrots and dressing, or celery and peanut butter for snacks. They also do 100% juice drinks. No added sugars. – Valerie<br />During parties and events, parents are asked to send in a range of goodies, which include lots of fresh fruits and veggies. Provided meals are well-rounded every day and they take the kids outside twice a day to run and play. Lots of exercise! - Laura<br />We choose healthy alternatives to the kids favorite snacks and introduce new healthy snacks to the point the kids look forward to snack times. They start asking for snack as soon as they come in because they can’t wait to see what new and exciting things we have for them! – Cheri<br />We do not allow sugar or gluten in my child’s classroom for snack. The children snack on rice crackers and fruit. – Julie<br />My child’s school sends out a monthly newsletter on tips for healthy snacks and activities both outdoors and indoors. The menu is also geared toward just healthy and organic. <br />– Catia<br />They recently had a green party where they learned all about the importance of the environment and being green. They also learned about organic foods and the importance of eating healthy and exercising to stay healthy. They encourage physical activity and creativity, which are two of the ways to stay healthy…keep your body and mind stimulated no matter what your age! - Melanie<br />They do not allow sweets for birthdays or any day, it always needs to be a healthy snack. They also send home reminders about what are considered healthy snacks and give us little recipes to try that are fun and nutritious for the kids! - Lauren<br />Organic milk, healthy snacks of fruit and when we have holiday parties, which are put on by the mothers, we always try to bring healthy, organic cookies or drinks as well as introduce new and cool fruits! - Jennifer<br />Taking stretch and move breaks every hour. – Michelle<br />They have grown their own veggie plants, and teach daily through song and books that healthy is fun and make the body run better. – Kim<br />We always include trays of cut-up fruits and vegetables for our parties, plus make , sure that our drinks are not loaded with artificial sweeteners and/or too much sugar. – Robin<br />Making sure that they learn about how and where food is grown. The benefits and nutrients that these foods contain to make them grow stronger and bigger. Growing plants and veggies gardens so the kids can see the process from seed to feed! - Laureen<br />Our children get two fruit breaks (one in the morning and one in the afternoon) per day and their teachers have been very specific about what items are allowed for snacks. No candy, only fresh fruit, cheese, yogurt, fresh vegetables, all-natural or organic chips or crackers allowed and no sugar-added drinks. Not only does this instill good eating habits in our children, it also makes parents more aware of how we teach our children to love healthy food. Along with good eating habits, our children engage in physical activity at school, which I understand has been removed from several educational systems. Our teachers are creative when it comes to keeping little bodies active. – Lanie<br />They constantly encourage healthy eating throughout the entire school year and summer months too! They also now have more multi-grain foods available on the lunch menu, such as whole grain pancakes. Our child’s class is involved in a lot of physical activity, including a wonderful physical-education class 1-2 times each week and a perfect amount of recess time each day. – Sarah<br />They emphasize that kids should be eating healthy lunches and snacks. The school also has a fruit and veggies program where once a week a new fruit or veggie is brought in for the kids to try. – Kim<br />The university where I work stopped frying food, everything is now baked. – Donna<br />Our kids classrooms make an effort to be healthy by encouraging all parents and students to provide healthy snacks for their children, not just everyday, but for those special occasions too. For my oldest one’s birthday we send in a platter of fresh fruit for her class to enjoy instead of any kind of cake or candy and it’s a big hit with everybody! As parents, we also take turns donating cases of water to their classrooms, as well as natural juices on occasion, to encourage healthy drinking choices as well. – Jennifer<br />They have lots of physical activity special events. My favorite is “Marathon Month” where every kid in school receives a walking/running log and is encouraged to accumulate 26.2 miles in that month. Each school day there are before school and after school walking activities to help kids meet the goal. – Anna<br />My child attends a Waldorf-inspired charter school and part of its philosophy stresses eating organic foods. The children have planted a garden and will be able to eat some of the harvest. They also spend time outdoors every day, getting plenty of exercise. – Maryellen<br />Our surprise snacks are 100% juice and air popped popcorn. We also have a running club and we are making a video about anti-graffiti in the school grounds. The kids just did a fundraiser that is centered around running laps to raise money for art funding for their school. – Sandi<br />Parents donate nutritious snacks for the students to eat during STAR testing. Students have studied the food pyramid and know to eat foods “of many different colors!” - Tim<br />My boys’ classes have dance parties. They dace to songs like “Cotton-Eyed Joe” and “Tonight’s Gonna be a Good Night” and they learn the moves. Whenever those songs are playing somewhere, the boys are dancing around and doing their moves! It gets them going for sure! – Arick<br />My childs school recently celebrated nutrition week. Every day had a different color, and children were encouraged to try different fruits and vegetables from the color of the day. My kids enjoyed trying blue, yellow, orange, red and green fruits and vegetables and love to bring healthy snacks to their classroom. – Lori<br />My daughter’s classroom is always on the lookout for germs and she has developed a true love for washing her hands at school and at home. While I appreciate her newfound cleanliness, what I really love is that her school feeds fresh, organic meals to the students every day! – Snikiddy Fan<br />We are blessed to live in a community that is health-conscious, a nutritionist visits the classrooms once a year to teach the children about healthy eating. Out elementary school has a salad bar that uses local ingredients whenever possible and ingredients, which come fro the school’s garden. Yes! The school has an amazing garden where all the children participate in growing food that is used in their own lunches. – Erika<br />In my classroom we send a healthy basket home every week with one family. They are then to bring in various fruits, vegetables and snacks that are healthy and new to the children. We try to excite the children about new foods. We also take into account any allergies or dietary restrictions that our families may have. – Andrea<br />My daughter’s kindergarten teachers is very health conscious and sets an amazing example for the kids. For class parties the kids munch on veggies and fruit with dips they made themselves, and have enjoyed other healthy snacks—no cookies or cupcakes allowed unless they have cooked them in the classroom. She has also requested that parents not send in birthday treats—instead we made a donation to the class in honor of our daughter. This is catching on throughout the building at tour school. – Cara<br />Everybody has one day of the month where they need to bring a healthy snack for lunch for the whole class! And they have a special consultant come in and talk to the child and give them a sheet with ideas to be healthy at home. – Gabriela<br />Because of food intolerances in my son’s classroom, the teacher and some parents got together and came up with the idea to help teach the kids about the reasons why some kids can’t have things but then to also point out things that they can have and how they’re just like everyone else. So every week they do a “food of the week” and learn about it, different ways to make it or eat it, how it helps the body or how it harms the body. The school also has a garden so it helps bring in more fruits and veggies into the kids’ diets. The teacher, the principal and kids are impressed by this. – Jen<br />We hold cooking classes and only use healthy, organic ingredients where the recipes are overseen by a registered dietician. Some of the kids favorite recipes are pink flamingo smoothies (organic low fat yogurt, fresh/frozen fruits, premium OJ) and rainbow pizza pockets (organic whole wheat dough, organic sauce, variety of colorful veggies). – Doug<br />The children have a reusable bag in which they bring healthy snacks back to school in. On the bag there are recipes and suggestions for healthy snacks. – Melissa<br />My child’s classroom makes an effort to be healthy by doing projects on health as well as keeping track of what they eat each week. They bring it back to the class for presentation.<br /> – Sable<br />My 2nd grade classroom has made a pledge to eat a healthy snack each and every day. Thy like to track how many healthy snacks they eat each month! We also had a “Healthy Hearts” party on Valentine’s Day- this was a party filled with heart healthy snacks (instead of the traditional candy and sweets Valentine’s Day party). We exercise as a classroom as many times as possible during the week (even if it’s a simple 5 minutes of jumping jacks and toe touches). I also try to incorporate as many healthy foods when we are learning about different regions of the world. - Christina<br />They are always exposing the kids to different foods and encouraging them to try different fruits and vegetables. They also make eating healthy fun. For instance, coloring their milk with food coloring so they get to have red milk with their cereal. - Vera<br />The first week of school my daughter’s teacher sent out notes saying “Healthy kids start with every parent communication with me and the room mom. Please send in a list of healthy, wholesome snacks and treats you’d like our class to have. We can’t purchase every suggestion, but the list will be our healthy shopping list.” – Snikiddy Fan<br />My son’s school has the lunch program catered to ensure that they receive food from the four food groups daily. If lunch is brought from home, they ask that no candy or soda be added and to try and use food from the four food groups as well. – Debbee<br />The teach has taught the concept of a balanced meal and they did a project where they had to create a menu for their own restaurant that serves only balanced meals. My daughter now checks off her food groups in every meal before staring to eat. - Ruchira<br />