Children love to play outside in the sunshine – especially when they’re surrounded by other children on a playground, and since many schools fail to offer enough free-play time outdoors – getting your children to the playground after school each day is important for their health and overall well-being. Playing at the playground gives children the opportunity to use their gross motor, problem solving, communication and social skills. However, according to the Center for Disease Control, more than 200,00 children ages 14 and younger are treated in the emergency room due to playground-related injuries. With that in mind, read on to learn how you can reduce the risk of injury and keep your children safe at the playground.
According to the Chicago Tribune, Little Village Academy a public school in Chicago has banned children from bringing their own lunches from home, unless they have a medical condition or food allergy. The reasoning behind the ban – to encourage healthy eating. I don’t know exactly what the public schools in Chicago are serving for lunch, but I have seen some of the foods being served in the public school system and I wouldn’t consider them healthy!
I have a question, what if your child is vegetarian, vegan, eats only organic, or doesn’t want to throw away milk containers, plastic ware, napkins and other food packaging everyday? The answer, if you child goes to Little Village Academy, the only choices that your child has is to eat school lunch or forgo lunch altogether.
To look at this from the school’s prospective for a moment, I can understand that many parents don’t pack their children a whole, nutritious lunch. And I have witnessed children who open their lunchboxes to find Crustables, chips, candy bars and soda. In these cases should the schools beable to tell parents what their children should be eating by banning that type of lunch brought from home?
What are your thoughts?
Whose responsibility do you think it is to ensure that our children are eating a healthy lunch?
Do you think that the government should have a say to prevent children from bringing junk food
for lunch?
Or do you think it is up to the parents to decide how their children should eat?
Would you continue to send your child to a school that dictates what they will or won’t eat for lunch?
Do you want my two cents? Maybe, rather than banning homemade lunches, this Chicago public school should ban children from bringing junk food to school. Just a thought. photo credit Ben+Sam
Transcendental Meditation can have a profound impact on many facets of our lives and a new study shows that it can also improve children’s academic performance. The study conducted at a California public middle school on 189 students showed that 41 percent of the meditating students gained at least one level in math performance. Students with the lowest levels of academic performance showed a significant improvement in overall academic achievement. If Transcendental Meditation can improve middle school students’ academic performance then why not try meditation with younger children? Plus, there’s a chance you may find it’s beneficial to other areas of your child’s lifestyle. Speaking from personal experience I can tell you that Transcendental Meditation has affected Eben’s life. I recently wrote about ways to implement meditation into your child’s lifestyle at Inhabitots. You can add it to your own lifestyle too!
I recently read and reviewed Rebecca P. Cohen’s new lifestyle book called 15 Minutes Outside for Inhabitots. 15 Minutes Outside focuses around what would happen if you and your kids got outside everyday. Author Rebecca asked herself that question and found that this simple concept has huge rewards. Seems easy enough to get outside right? The reality is that children are spending 30 hours a week in front of a screen and clocking only 4 to 7 of the 60 recommended minutes of daily unstructured playtime outside. Since 1 in 3 children are obese – this concept can be life changing. 15 Minutes Outside is much more than a book chock full of 365 ways to spend time outside with your children each day, it’s a book that can have profound effects on the health, happiness and the well-being of your family. Check out some of the ideas here.
Yesterday, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the National Highway Traffic Administration updated their recommendations on car seats including keeping toddlers rear facing until age 2, and having kids ride in car seats as old as age 12. I have always felt that many parents were allowing their children to ride in a vehicle without the proper seat belt – once they reached a certain age. I have also been accused of making Eben use a car seat when others feel that he is simply too old for one (he is almost 10). However, after reading the new car seat recommendations on how long children should stay in one, I smiled. I just knew that keeping Eben in a car seat was a safer option, and I am glad that the recommendations have been changed. Read what I found out about the new recommended guidelines on car seats and join the discussion.
Children love to play outside in the sunshine – especially when they’re surrounded by other children on a playground, and since many schools fail to offer enough free-play time outdoors – getting your children to the playground after school each day is important for their health and overall well-being. Playing at the playground gives children the opportunity to use their gross motor, problem solving, communication and social skills. However, according to the Center for Disease Control, more than 200,00 children ages 14 and younger are treated in the emergency room due to playground-related injuries. With that in mind, read on to learn how you can reduce the risk of injury and keep your children safe at the playground.
