School Meals

Wellington Lunches

Current Menu

Wellington Lunches Policy

All Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 children are provided with a free school lunch.

You can select your child’s choice from the school menu using your Parent Pay login. If a choice is not selected, your child will be provided with the main meat option. Please do not provide your child with a packed lunch.

Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 children may also select their school lunch through the Parent Pay login. If payment is required, this will need to be made before any orders can be placed. If your child is entitled to a free school meal, you still need to select their choice.

If Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 children opt to bring a packed lunch, it must adhere to our healthy eating policy and not contain chocolate, sweets and fizzy drinks.

It is vital that no nut based products are brought into school as we have a number of children with severe nut allergies. If these are inadvertently packed, they will be removed from your child’s lunch box and returned to you at the end of the day.

Healthy Lunchbox Ideas

Lunch should supply approximately one third of the daily energy requirements your child needs, as well as a third of protein, carbohydrate, fats, fibre, vitamins and minerals.

Try to include:

One protein rich food such as fish, meat, eggs, poultry, tofu, pulses/beans or houmous

One carbohydrate food such as wholemeal or granary bread, pasta, oatcakes or rice. Try wholemeal/brown ‘complex’ carbohydrates as they release sugar much slower to help give children sustained energy

One preferably two portions of fresh fruit or dried fruit

One dairy food or calcium rich food such as cheese, yogurt, milk

One portion of salad or vegetables such as carrot sticks, celery, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, or a good amount of salad in a sandwich

200-300ml of water

Choose one from this list:

Wholemeal pittas with grated cheese and tomato or soft cheese and cucumber

Wholemeal sandwiches with tuna, mayo and cucumber

Wholemeal or white pasta twirls with tomato and vegetable sauce

Brown/white rice salad with tinned salmon, tomatoes, cucumber & spring onion

Homemade soup in flask and wholemeal or granary roll

Small pot of houmous with wholemeal/white pitta, oatcakes or breadsticks and chopped cucumber, peppers, carrots, celery, cherry tomatoes

Tinned tuna/salmon or chicken or egg salad with lots of crunchy vegetables

Tortilla wraps with avocado and chicken salad or any of the above fillings

Chicken drumstick with crunchy salad (peppers, carrots, lettuce, cherry tomatoes)

Choose two from this list (preferably one or two fruit and one vegetable):

Fresh fruit salad (minimum 3 different pieces)

Two pieces of whole fruit – try smaller sized

One portion of dried fruit and one fresh fruit

Cherry tomatoes

Raw carrot sticks

Cucumber stick

Celery sticks

Calcium rich foods:

Cheese cubes

Natural yoghurt with fresh fruit to add in

Fruit yoghurt

Small carton of milk

Healthier Extras/Snacks:

Flapjack

Small pack of dried fruit

Plain popcorn

Rice cakes (plain or flavoured)

Blueberry or fruit muffin

Vegetable Sticks with houmous

Boiled egg (children like to shell them themselves)

Fresh Fruit or Raisins

Drinks:

Include a bottle of still water in your child’s packed lunch. We only allow water to drink. Soft/fizzy/fruit juice drinks are not allowed as they are packed with sugar and often colourings, additives, preservatives and aspartame (a sugar substitute), which can become addictive and affect moods.

Unhealthy Lunchbox

Avoid processed foods in your child’s lunch box as they are high in sugar, saturated fats, salt and often have chemical additives, preservatives, colourings and sugar substitutes that can change children’s behaviour and can prevent them from concentrating.

Things to avoid are:

Crisps – high in fat, salt and often contains monosodium glutamate

MSG Sweets – high in sugar and colourings

Soft/fizzy/fruit based drinks – high in sugar, colourings and or aspartame (a sugar substitute)

Chocolate – high in fat and sugar

YES	NO
Oat cakes, Rice cakes	Sweets (mints, chewing gum, fruit pastels, liquorice, toffees, marsh mallows)
Yogurts	Crisps
Dried Fruits – raisins, mangos, apricots, etc	Chocolate
Unsweetened fruit juice	Fizzy/Soft Drinks
Cereal bars without any Hydrogenated Fats. Oat bars are best. Fruit muffins, carrot cakes, flapjacks	Colourings, Hydrogenated Fats, Monosodium Glutamate MSG, Aspartame

IMPORTANT: Please do not send any nuts or peanut butter into school as some children are allergic to them.

Breaktimes

All Reception and Keystage 1 children are provided with free fruit and vegetables as part of a Government scheme. Therefore, children up to Year 2 do not need to bring a snack for breaktime.

Unfortunately, this does not extend to Keystage 2. However, we recognise the need for all pupils to have a healthy snack at breaktime to keep their energy and fluid levels up.

Keystage 2 children are encouraged to bring fresh fruit and vegetables into school for their snack. This can also include dried fruit such as raisins and apricots.

We are always conscious of the environmental impact of additional packaging being brought into school, so where possible, please put your child’s snack in a Tupper wear container with their name on it so that there is not an excess of plastic bags or wrappers brought into school.

If your Keystage 2 child has packed lunch, please make sure their snack is put in their school bag, not their lunch box, so they can access it at breaktime without needing to go to the lunchbox storage area.

Please note: Fruit bars and fruit rolls that are in individual wrappers are not suitable for breaktime snacks. They often contain additives and a game card, which can cause issues if lost or swapped! These can be included in lunch boxes if your child puts the game card and wrapper back in their box and takes it home.

Water Bottles

We encourage all children to bring a water bottle into school each day.

These should be kept in the classroom for easy access and can be taken outside during break and lunchtimes so that water can be drunk during these times of physical activity.

Each class teacher will have their own system for where water bottles are stored in class, depending on the age of the children and the classroom layout. Children are encouraged to have water at the beginning and end of lessons, rather than in the middle, to avoid disruptions to learning.

Water bottles should only contain still water. If a child is reluctant to drink plain water, this is something we want to overcome as its health benefits are enormous. There are a water bottles available with a section for fresh fruit infusions and this is a fun and colourful way to entice your child to drink water.

Please note: No fizzy drinks, fruit cordials, fruit juices or flavoured waters are allowed. Not only do they cause a sticky mess if spilt or if the bottle leaks in a child’s bag but they often contain sugar, colourings, additives, preservatives and aspartame (a sugar substitute), which can become addictive and affect moods. It is also not advisable for children to sip these drinks throughout the day as it can lead to tooth decay.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can my child bring squash into school?

No, squash, fizzy drinks, fruit cordials, fruit juices and flavoured water are not allowed in school. We encourage all children to bring a water bottle into school each day, if your child is reluctant to drink plain water, there are a water bottles available with a section for fresh fruit infusions and this is a fun and colourful way to entice your child to drink water.

Does my child need to bring a snack for breaktime?

All Reception and Keystage 1 children are provided with free fruit and vegetables as part of a Government scheme. Therefore, children up to Year 2 do not need to bring a snack for breaktime.

Keystage 2 children are encouraged to bring fresh fruit and vegetables into school for their snack. This can also include dried fruit such as raisins and apricots.

Does my child need to bring a lunchbox into school?

All Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 children are provided with a complulsory free school lunch.

Please do not send your child in with a packed lunch.

Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 children may also have a school lunch which parents can pay for via Pay360. If Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 children opt to bring a packed lunch, it must adhere to our healthy eating policy and not contain chocolate, sweets and fizzy drinks. It is vital that no nut based products are brought into school as we have a number of children with severe nut allergies.

My child wants school lunches but has specific dietary requirements, what should I do?

We provide a wide variety of choices for our Hot School Meals to cater to all tastes. If you wish to discuss your child’s particular needs, please contact the school for an appointment with the Harrison’s Chef Manager.