Health and Wellbeing

Healthy breaks for schools

If you are unsure what to put in your child's lunchbox, the following guidelines will help you make the right healthy choices.  Click here to view the full article or visit http://www.enjoyhealthyeating.info for healthy eating advice for all the family.

Better Health: Healthier Families

On the Better Health: Healthier Families website there are a number of great resources with everything you need to support key healthy eating messages to children and their families. All of these resources can be used on your interactive whiteboard. Click here to visit the website.

Snack smart!

Half the sugar children are having comes from snacks and sugary drinks.

Too much sugar can lead to harmful fat building up inside and serious health problems, including painful tooth decay.

Fruit and vegetables are always the best choice, but if you're shopping for packaged snacks for your children, use this helpful tip: look for 100 calorie snacks, two a day max!

Click to view the article: Snack smart

Make a swap when you next shop

With 34% of children leaving primary school overweight, this campaign, “make a swap when you next shop”, encourages families to cut back on sugar. To complement the national campaign, which has been in the media spotlight, interactive lesson plans have been created in partnership with teachers, qualified nutritionists and dental professionals. These English and Maths teaching resources support teachers to educate pupils about how much sugar is in their everyday food and drink, and to empower them to make healthier choices.

The resources are set in ‘Sugar Smart World’ and teach pupils that the number of extra sugar cubes they are consuming is enough to wrap around the world more than three and a half times. A cartoon- themed Science lesson plan also helps pupils understand the effects that sugar has on their teeth. Share these free resources with your networks to help tackle childhood obesity.

Resources include:English lesson plan PowerPoints and worksheets, including songs and a poster, comic strip and persuasive letter template for children aged 5 to 11 years old (school years 1 to 6)

• Maths lesson plan PowerPoints and worksheets for each school year for children aged 5 to 11 years old (school years 1 to 6)
• Early years lesson plan PowerPoint for children under 5 years old (nursery and Reception)
• Science lesson plans and PowerPoints for children aged 5 to 11 years old (school years 1 to 6), in which pupils set up a simple science experiment to observe how sugar can affect teeth, and learn about making better choices to stay healthy
• display board print-outs for schools to showcase their pupils’ work and promote healthier swaps to families
• recipe idea print-outs with healthy recipes from around the world for teachers to make with pupils and send home to families.

Asthma Friendly Schools 

Asthma is the most common long-term medical condition in children in the UK, with around 1 in 11 children and young people in the UK having asthma. 

The UK has one of the highest prevalence, emergency admission, and death rates for childhood asthma in Europe. 13 children (0-14 years) died from asthma in 2016. 

NHS England and NHS Improvement’s  ambition is to prevent deaths, reduce the number of admissions and improve the quality of life of CYP with asthma. This will be achieved by improving the accuracy of diagnosis and taking a whole system approach to managing asthma.

Find out more about asthma friendly schools here.

Importance of Teeth brushing

Good oral health is very important for children’s health and wellbeing and being shown how to properly brush teeth and being encouraged to do so regularly will have a positive impact. There are many reasons to support pupils oral health including=

• Issues around oral health are the biggest reason for under-fives to be hospitalised; 
• Poor oral health can effect the physical health of the rest of the body;
• Poor oral health can be a reason for poor behaviour and concentration (toothache, abscesses, etc) which can also lead to attendance dropping which therefore can also impact attainment.

In 2022, a shocking 60,000 school days were missed due to tooth extractions and 1 in 5 children aged 3-5 in England experienced tooth decay. The sad truth is that this is largely preventable.

Please visit the big brush club's website for more information and tips on promoting oral health and speak to your lead teacher as promoting good oral health could be an intervention towards your healthy school award.