How did we get to this?

It is very interesting to get the views of teachers and to know that it was not just me as a parent who was exasperated by all this. How frustrating it must have been for those teachers who wished to remain true to their subject and who valued what they had to teach.

Interestingly, in spite of this, my DDs and their partners all love to cook and to experiment with recipes etc. - perhaps that is their backlash.

merlotgran I could have written your post myself. I am another Food Tech teacher who is so glad to be retired. Do you remember the first Technology SATS tests ? Our 14yr old pupils had to 'Design and Make' a healthy cereal bar and include ingredients from a list. The list of these so called 'healthy' ingredients included margarine, sugar, syrup and chocolate. It was a taste of what was to come (no pun intended).
I could also have written your post Mishap. It made me so angry that our knowledge and skills of teaching a practical subject were reduced to such depths, but we were only in the classroom and could not possibly be trusted to teach what we knew the kids needed to know.
I'll stop now before I really get going !!

stillangrytenyearslater

That's lovely Mishap. I doubt if many teachers have the ability to organise something like that. Are there just one or two dedicated people who run it or do parents help?

The children at the village primary school where I am a governor have a very outdoor focus to their work. They have apple trees and a polytunnel to tend. They harvested the apples and made and bottled gallons of juice; they made jams and preserves from some of the polytunnel produce - all were sold at the local farmers' market opposite the school in the village hall and they have made a tidy sum for school funds. They did engage with the idea of suitable packaging and labels etc., but they also learned about gardening, nutrition, hygiene, teamwork, maths, writing etc. This is what education should be about.

I am sure that most of the Grans on here teach our grandchildren to cook. My 5 year old GS is a whizz at peeling tomatoes to make soup.

It's just a pity that some people can't be bothered and their children and grandchildren suffer.

Our GC love to pick their own sweetcorn and we cook it lightly immediately. Delicious! One tip that was very successful is to grown peas in big plastic tubs. It keeps youngsters quiet for ages, picking all the peas and eating them raw.

DD is given a printout of school menus. The choice is either a blue or red tray, both consisting of meals she would be giving GDs herself. On the odd days that GDs want a packed lunch, usually because they and their friends have planned this, the school rule is, no sweets or fizzy drinks allowed in lunch boxes.

GD1 who is 9 has just had her first baking lesson at school. Empire biscuits which were sold to family and friends for school funds.

Hopefully, someone will decide that basic cookery is an essential skill and it is reintroduced into the school curriculum.

Been there, done that, glamma with similar results.

I remember one session being devoted to 'smart shopping' - in other words, making a little money go a long way. We went through how to make a shopping list because some of them had never done that. One mother said all she did was look in the freezer and count how many pizzas she had left.

You can have little money and still eat well. My strapping young nephew would come in raving about the fish and rice meals that his West Indian colleague's mum used to serve to her large family on a tight budget, plus there'd always be loads of it. And remember "a girl called Jack" and her budget recipes ...

A couple of years ago DD and a few others joined a group to help mums budget and cook easy meals from scratch,all went well for a couple of weeks and the classes gradually dropped of, some of the reasons given where they liked to watch daytime TV and couldn't get to the supermarket to do a shop for the ingredients even if DD or pals offered to take them.The idea was closed down and has never been started up again a real slap in the face for the mums who tried to help people get themselves organised with their cooking skills.

This is from the fareshare website in August.

www.fareshare.org.uk/more-people-are-suffering-from-malnutrition-as-a-result-of-food-poverty/

Isn't it the Autumn statement next week? Doubtless Gideon will tell us how he is going to shaft the poor even more before the next election in that.

Yes I also read that this morning and agree this will be a huge factor, and likely to get far worse if the next lot of cuts are to go by. £30bn how on earth is that going to happen?

Whitewave, CEO of Action for Children, also on the board of Defra.

https://www.gov.uk/government/people/tony-hawkhead

www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/15/coalition-helped-rich-hitting-poor-george-osborne

Could this be the reason we got to this, whitewave?

We had no choice - dinner monitors went up to the serving hatches and came back with the containers and we ate it! Questions were asked if anything was left but we all seemed to clear our plates without any trouble regardless of what it was.

In Scotland Primary school are going to get free dinners starting in January. Which sounds very good in theory but unless they change how the children can choose what they want it could end up with a lot more food wasted & very unhealthy children.

My DGS started school this year & takes packed lunches except for Fridays. His Mum thought it would be good for him to have the experience of queuing & choosing his own lunch & clearing his plate etc. away afterwards.

However his usual choice seems to be mashed potato & pasta with rice krispies in custard for pudding!
When his Mum asked him why he didn't choose any vegetables he said with a cheeky grin " because you're not there mum"

Who is the CEO? Where does he/she come from?

I have just been looking at the Action for Children website.
In a 39 page report on neglect, malnutrition is mentioned just once.
In an 84 page Impact Report for last year, it does not get mentioned at all.
Is the CEO doing his job in either Defra or Action for Children?

i recently retired from a secondary school, where the Food Technology teacher told me that the students had problems creating some of the dishes required because the parents could not afford to provide meat/ expensive ingredients and risk the food being wasted.

Making simple pasta and cake recipes were popular, but only taught limited skills. There could have been adaptions, but they had to stick to the syllabus.

Years ago when they raised the school leaving age, students who had 'spare' lessons were taught life skills that included basic cooking with little cost. x

Sadly that's what happened when food became an 'ology, Mishap

Even in Home Economics I thought there was far too much emphasis on the 'boring stuff'. Kids need to be taught to cook, cook and cook. We had two very well equipped food rooms but an hour for a practical????

A lot of them opted for Food Tech at GCSE because they could spend loads of time sitting at a computer designing packaging and as for making meals healthier by replacing sugar with sweetener......Really??

Ridiculous!!

I'm glad I'm out of it.

If the children got a good quality supermarket shepherds pie or chicken curry when they got home, after a school lunch, they would be fine. If the parents can't or won't cook, it's the next best thing. Probably better in some cases. Does anyone on here actually look at the ingredients on the pack?

Child nutrition could well stem from the same causes that make the parents fat. I agree school 'cookery' should replace 'food technology'. Back to basics please.

It would be an interesting lesson I think to look at someone who is so poor and the budget they have to manage on every week and how they spend it.

Whitewave, I agree with what you say. I have asked Steve Webb if he is ashamed of what is happening to pensioners.
I have just heard about the report that you talk of on the radio. As the doctor said, the kids do not present with malnutrition, but with pneumonia, etc. Then they discover they are malnourished.
It all goes together. Most malnourishment occurs in poor families.

Just said on another thread about the number of people in one town in the North East who go without heating and are handed out sleeping bags by the Salvation Army. Lots are pensioners but many are families. Like when said, if there's no money, there's no food, except what they are given from a food bank.

I have just looked at the board members of Defra and there are more accountants and people who have studied PPE than farmers.
One of the members was previously the CEO of Tate and Lyle, and is now the CEO of Balfour Beatty and on the board of PWC. In fact three have connections with PWC, so it's all about finance, not food.

Only one of the four ministers has anything to do with farming.
One board member, believe it or not, is also the CEO at Action for Children, so he's not being listened to.

There is clearly no one answer to this problem but my guess would be that the graph showing child poverty and children malnutrition it aligned.

I agree with the remarks made about the lack of proper education regarding domestic skills and here I think study would show that this tended to kick in with the rise (and this goes against the grain to say this) of feminism. Our domestic science lessons at school when I look back were absolutely outstanding. We were taught how to care for a child from birth and this included dietary needs and physical needs. From the type of clothing to the type of equipment. We also were taught household management, and cookery skills including nutritional requirements and budgeting that would knock the socks off what the children seem to be taught today, not least what we see on the television in so called expert cookery programmes. I left that school with the entire range of skills needed to run a home. Of course I had a few A's as well which helped immediately!!!

But none of this is any good assuming the children were given this type of education, if they do not have the where-with-all to achieve this. With the best will in the world poverty and the worry grinds you down day after day.

NightowlI agree with you. I am sure there are many needy cases, but having seen the amount of junk food included in packed lunch boxes in a school with comparatively few free school meals ( pre universal free school meals) it's not hard to see why children are malnourished. Apparently as a nation we spend a much smaller proportion of our net income on food than we did in the fiftys and sixty s . Other things take priority, and not just necessities. My two year old GD s dentist was surprised that she consumes zero fizzy drinks and sweets.