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@azjax: That is true, but we can't control other people. If the rest of the class is ok with this, and the tuition money is rolling in, then the OP can either try to change the school culture in a positive way, or choose to go elsewhere?
I didn't mean to get into such a heated debate over this! My only reason for responding to Looch's post was to point out that people defending the ice cream may also hate the ice cream just as much as the other posters, but they also realize that not fraying the relationship with the care providers over small differences is an equally important value to hold.
I'll shut up now!
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@kpc324: I wouldn't say pizza's the worst thing in the world, but I didn't think a toddler needed it every week. It's greasy, lots of calories, etc. The pizza they get is delivery-type pizza from a place in the same plaza.
@Anagram: I don't consider myself super crazy about food and I just realized I've never fed DS a granola bar, and he's 3.5.
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@Mrs. Sketchbook: I don't think a lot of people really have the flexibility of just choosing new care providers, though, there really isn't that much choice out there. I think it comes down to choosing your battle and being able to voice your opinion. We are paying for a service, it doesn't mean that we have to accept everything that comes down. I do think we all need to possibly work on our delivery and this is something I am actively working on. Just because I wouldn't get offended, doesn't mean someone else won't either.
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@gingerbebe: I was going to say the same thing about sugar! My kid is allergic to dairy so he doesn't eat yogurt. But I'm always shocked at how much sugar is in them!
I say go with the ice cream and make sure to stop at the park an extra time over the weekend. To me the biggest health issue is kids not getting enough exercise/outside time.
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@Mrs. Sketchbook: gotcha. I would die if my daycare did sticker charts for thumb sucking though! That would be my hill to die on.
Sometimes I wonder how I got to be so "crunchy", since I grew up in super, super, super small, conservative, dusty west Texas where I got spanked with a PADDLE in school and there was always the thread of the belt at home, etc. etc. No one ate organic or cared or whatever.
Maybe it's because I'm a teacher and by middle school you can already see some "effects" of parenting choices? I don't know. I just know that I'm a 180 from the environment I came from, and these threads really remind me of it, haha. It's interesting.
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@Anagram: Yes, and why is that (that the adults have a harder time with it than the children)?
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@looch: I didn't say you have to accept it - I mean clearly you're not and others feel the same way. But I think it's the way it is in America because we live in such a diverse culture that food becomes a bridging mechanism. We are uncomfortable with the "other" language or culture but we can bond over a treat. I mean even the myth of Thanksgiving is that the pilgrims and natives broke bread together despite not understanding each other's language. I think the unfortunate result of that is that as a society we deal with anxiety and stress by eating.
Perhaps other, more homogenous cultures don't deal with these issues on this level, but virtually every culture does have some tradition of hospitality related to food - but we get subjected to all of them in America. Because if we don't, it's exclusionary or rude or whatever.
It gets worse with kids because we want so much for them to feel included and comfortable and what not. Plus we have some irrational fear that our kids are all starving.
So I totally hear all the moms who are concerned about obesity and don't want a food centered/treat centered culture, but I think there's always some philosophical stance or issue you have to work through as a parent that is against the mainstream and for some it's food and sugar and for some it's something else.
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@ShootingStar: I am a very junky eater for myself. True story. Despite my parents being great role models for eating, as an adult, I've slipped into a too-processed, too-sugared, too-salted type of american diet.
But having my kids be MSPI changed SO MUCH about what I know about food. I can't unknow the fact that soy is in *everything* now, and reading all those labels has showed me how much added junk there is in everything. My kids never ate yogurt either, or those breakfast biscuits all my friends give--or goldfish crackers. First because they had dairy and soy, and now because I think it's all just junk. Now that LO1 is almost 4, I have loosened up a little but it's kind of like screen time. Once the genie is out of the bottle, it's hard to get it back in.
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@looch: just societal conditioning. I don't mind (nicely! I think....) bucking certain daycare ideas though, when it's important to me. Like my daycare wanted all the new walkers in shoes, like real shoes not the soft ones. And I brought up several articles and shared it with the teachers and the directors about how hard soled shoes are not beneficial for new walkers. And first they made an "exception" for my kid, but then later when my kiddo moved up, I noticed they stopped the hard sole shoe policy in the infant room 2 altogether.
You can't get a yes if you don't at least try, right?
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@Anagram: I agree, everything is open to negotiation. I just need to work on my delivery. I tend to not small talk and just get right to the point and a lot of people instead need to be stroked and told how fabulous they are before they're open to hearing new ideas.
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@looch: I'm not good at delivery, either. I always approach it like, "All the recent research says......blah blah", that way it isn't coming from ME, but coming from an authority, haha. That works with my husband and our parents anyway. If it's just from me, they don't really believe it.
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@looch: I also think parents have way more power to affect change than they know. I know if I suggest something new to my administration, nothing will happen. But if 2-3 parents suggest it, then suddenly it's a big deal.
Like for years, research has been saying kids need MORE recess, not less. But schools won't move on that until tenacious parents get involved and say they are serious about wanting their kids to have more unstructured play time. It's like school districts are afraid parents are going to be mad about having too much play time, so they keep everything the same....even though every study now says it's less beneficial to kids to have them sitting too long.
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Hi all! OP here. I'm not going to respond to everyone but I love the debate and discussion. A lot of interesting issues.
I think I am going to let LO have the ice cream although I'm not happy about it, really. I am glad I emailed the school. Maybe if they get other feedback from parents, they will consider changing the policy.
My LO is a pretty picky eater (some of it is from being a MSPI/reflux baby - he was pretty delayed on solids and couldn't eat a lot of normal things), so I'm a bit worried that introducing more treats might make the pickiness worse, but oh well. Like for example, I gave him a bite of a graham cracker, and now every morning he stands next to our pantry and yells "Cracker, cracker!". But, maybe if it is a school only thing that won't happen.
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@gingerbebe: Word.
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@gingerbebe: I think you're right on a lot of points, particularly on the bonding over food. A lot of cultures do it!
I think I am also hyper concerned about food related celebrations because they tend to exclude my son (because of his oral motor issues). He doesn't seem to care, but I get all worked up. And I am working on that.
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@MrsADS: I know you mentioned your lo is picky, you may find they just don't eat the ice cream. I never worried about sugary treats at daycare because my daughter is so picky she wouldn't eat them. At the Christmas party she devoured the strawberries and ignored everything else.
ETA: my parents were super strict about sugar when I was a kid, and I am now a sugar addict. My husbands parents let him have whatever he wanted and he could care less about sweets . So I'm going the not making sweets a forbidden fruit sort of strategy since in my small sample size (me and my husband ) that seems to work better!
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Our school lets the kids help make popsicles out of fruit juice. They do this instead of ice cream, because there are 2 vegan kids and 2 kids with dairy allergies. I think it probably feels so good to have a cold treat in the summer (they are outside 3+ hours per day).
I will say, I would think a graham cracker probably has a lot of sugar, no?
If it were me, I would offer another solution rather than just protesting the ice cream.
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@Peasinapod: We can double your sample size, lol. My parents were extremely strict about sugar, and my husband's parents weren't. He tends to not care whether or not he gets sugar, whereas I crave treats!
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@peasinapod I hope you are right! Fruit is his #1 favorite food so hopefully it stays that way. also @tlynne agree I don't want to be too restrictive and make him a crazy sugar addict. I'm fine with things in moderation. It's just that at such a young age (20 months) he doesn't even know what that stuff is, and I hate to introduce it to him if he's oblivious, you know?
@littlejoy that is a great idea! I bet that is so fun for the kids too. I would actually much prefer for them to do that for the older kids, rather than letting them pick huge full size ice cream bars. We try not to go crazy with the graham crackers but that's a good point. I think 2 full sheets have like 8g sugar, and he never eats more than 1/4 of that.
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@Anagram: sticker chart for thumb sucking is downright traumatic. They also took away his privilege to play Legos at all because he got upset and hit someone over having to share them. Personally I think it would be more useful to teach them how to regulate emotions than to take away privileges. That being said, I see why they don't have time to deal with managing every child's outbursts with the amount of empathy that I would provide at home, so I let it go and tried to manage his disappointment at home. As a related, you know I teach at a rural community college....Well yesterday one of my students got so mad about a minor mistake I made that I had to have him escorted out by campus safety. So maybe this thread triggered my anxiety about how educators are often treated like service providers and not as educators. I agree that being from the south has made me more crunchy, but sadly around here crunchy isn't yet totally mainstream so I have to play the negotiation game all the time....Being blue in a red state is kinda difficult!
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This wouldn't bother me in the least. Summer is a special time around here anyways....we get only 3 months of good weather. He's almost 2. I probably give my kids ice cream multiple times a week all summer.
Also, I guess I don't view pizza as junk food. So, a day of pizza and ice cream doesn't sound like mcdonalds, juice boxes, and sour patch kids to me.
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I have no advice as I'm only 19wks with our first....but I think the discussion about sugar craving and restriction as kids is really interesting.
In our case, my parents were very restrictive of sweets. They never limited it when we were out, but we rarely had it at home. I'm not kidding when I say my dad would lock Ho-Ho's in his bed-side table to dole out in lunch boxes sparingly
I am a total sugar ADDICT. I love to bake, though, so almost everything I eat is totally homemade (not that it reduces calories!!). My husband on the other hand had tons of sugar everyday as a kid. Gatorade round-the-clock, pint of Ben and Jerrys every night, Reese's puffs cereal for breakfast, etc. He could care less about that stuff now. He's very health-conscious and just doesn't crave sweets like I do.
I know it's totally anecdotal, but it's interesting to think that we had very different diets growing up, but I have a much harder time with moderation of sweets. -
@annem1990 I think it's very interesting! I think upbringing may be part of it, and I think some people do have more of a sweet tooth. My husband really could take or leave desserts, he would much rather have chips or something, while I would pick sweet over savory any day. I definitely wasn't restricted from sweets while growing up, although it wasn't crazy or anything, I don't think. Same for him.
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This wouldn't really bother me. I try to balance really healthy meals and snacks with treats for lo (and dh and me.) And I'll add to the personal anecdotes about sugar/treat restrictions as a child. My parents seriously restricted our sugar intake as children and both my brother and I have had issues with craving junk, hiding food, rewarding ourselves with food etc. My husband ate literally whatever he wanted, with lots of junk thrown in, and has a much healthier attitude toward food.
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I'll add to the "anecdotes" about growing up. DH wasn't restricted from sweets growing up, but he also grew up in a developing country and didn't have access to the types/amount of packaged foods and sweets that his family has now in the US and Canada. DH is the biggest sugar addict I know. Although he is skinny, he isn't all that healthy in his diet and his parents both struggle with high blood pressure, high sugars (careening into type 2 diabetes soon I think), high cholesterol, etc.
My sugar intake was limited growing up I guess--my parents both grew up on farms and were really into fresh foods and didn't buy a lot of processed treats. I'm one of 6 kids and we are pretty split. 3 of us have struggled with weight as adults, 3 have not struggled. But my brother who was a struggler got cancer at the age of 29 and for the last decade has eaten a super clean diet and is now maybe a little underweight and in great health. So we are currently 4 fit adults, and 2 overweight adults (I am now one of the overweight ones.).
So...anecdotal evidence in our case doesn't really show any trends. Except that overall healthful foods make a healthier person, no matter how they grew up.
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If I were in this situation, I would totally let my DD have the ice cream. Although we are pretty lax food wise. It wouldn't bother me in the least though, and I would be happy that DD is getting a treat. We rarely ever do desserts at home, maybe occasionally on the weekends.
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@MrsADS: I don't have a sweet tooth, but I ate like garbage as a child ... I'm honestly not sure when I had fresh fruits and veggies for the first time. Everything was from a can. My after school snack would either be Oreos or Pizza Rolls. I was a monster child.
I'd much rather have a pickle than a popsicle ... LO is totally into sweets (but she doesn't get them very often because she's a nut job when she has sugar).
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@annem1990: so a few weeks ago I caught my kid getting into the candy box (an old shoe box that I out all candy left over from holidays). He totally snuck into the pantry, shut the door, and started pigging out. Then at Easter I caught him under a tree in our yard just destroying a pile of candy he had gotten at school earlier that day that I hadn't hidden yet. It made me sad that he felt the need to hide and gorge like that! So I am going to try not to be obsessed with his sugar intake to see if I can correct for that behavior. It is annoying that I didn't buy any of that stuff in the first place but nevertheless, from now on if I'm going to keep it in the house we are going to enjoy it and then move on with our lives.
I am a total sugar ADDICT. I love to bake, though, so almost everything I eat is totally homemade (not that it reduces calories!!). 
I'd much rather have a pickle than a popsicle ... LO is totally into sweets (but she doesn't get them very often because she's a nut job when she has sugar).
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