As a school we wanted to improve the health and wellbeing of all our pupils through diet and physical activities. In order to do this, we as a school, also needed to be educated. Our Head was already in contact with Harriet from Phunky Foods, Copeland area, but did not have the time to implement it effectively himself. In September I got made HLTA and was given the DT lead role. I had no idea where to begin. Luckily Harriet came into school and pointed me in the right direction. She delivered a staff meeting for us to get us started, showed us how to use their website to access all the resources we needed. Our aim was to make children more aware of healthier choices, hidden sugars and how they can make a choice to become healthier and look after their own health and wellbeing. We have also used Phunky Foods to help us re-write our food school policy as well as introduce a healthy snack and packed lunch section to it.
We use Phunky Foods for our DT food, Scheme of Work from year 1 to year 6. The teachers find this very easy to follow and the children love the recipes. It clearly shows how the children progress from year to year with their skills and vocabulary. Recently, class 4 made pizza’s and loved every minute of it. As it was the first time the class teacher was delivering the lesson, Harriet came in to support him and she was a huge help.
Thanks to a Food Prep Training Course I attended and the Cook Kit we were given, we set up a very successful KS2 After School Cookery Club for 15 children. They love it so much that we have had to setup a KS1 cookery club to deal with the number of children wanting to partake. We use the recipes for this club from the website and access the short videos for cookery skills in most lessons, which are a great help.
We have used the PhunkyFoods Ambassador scheme to help deliver the Eat Well message throughout the whole school, using assemblies and competitions. Our 4 year 5’s have introduced ‘Fruity Fridays’ and looked into healthier snacks and discussed, using an assembly, why fruit is a better option than a biscuit even if the calories are the same. Not only has this scheme helped to educate our children, it has also boosted the skills and confidence of the year 5s involved.
We have used the resources on the PF website a lot throughout the school; the Phunky15 and the PPA resources are used frequently as well as the Mindful Moments and the children really enjoy them, especially the ‘Walk in the Woods’ – this is requested a lot.
Because of Covid we have not involved parents as much as we would like to with our assemblies or workshops. However, we keep them posted through our newsletter and Seesaw on what we are doing in school. We post cookery updates, send home recipe cards and offer healthy options for packed lunches and snacks. We have also shared some of the activities to be done at home with parents, including walking a mile a day and walking to help get Ted home. Also, the link to the Phunky Foods website is often shared on our weekly newsletter for parents to visit. Next year we will be working hard, alongside Phunky Foods to spread the message to parents and throughout the community.
Caroline Thornthwaite, Moresby Primary School
