The following guidance sets out the basic steps to follow to ensure that you and the children are adequately prepared for food work and working with good practice in mind.

Why safety and hygiene matter
Understanding about food includes learning about associated risks and benefits. All children will handle food at regular points in their lives, egs. when eating food prepared by others or when preparing it for themselves. It is important that they become aware of the care that is needed when handling food. Learning to work in a safe and hygienic way with materials is part of the required primary curriculum, within science, as well as D&T.

Teachers should be aware about which hygiene and safety measures are necessary and how to teach children about them. This includes:

You should show due regard to potential risks that food activities pose (eg. the spread of micro-organisms during food preparation). Methods of keeping these under control (eg. good personal hygiene practice) should form the basis of good practice, both in terms of safety and hygiene.

Whenever others, such as support staff, parents or visitors, are involved in classroom food activities, you will need to make them aware of school procedures for safe and hygienic practice. They can then take a constructive role in supporting the agreed ways of working with children and food.

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Risk assessment
Risk assessment should underpin all aspects of food work in schools. You, and other teachers responsible for food activities, should assess any possible risk and consider how risks can be reduced using appropriate planning, management and organisation. Children should be taught how to carry out simple risk assessments of their own, rather than expecting this to be done for them. This is part of developing safety awareness and good working practices.

This means that children should be taught simple strategies for:

Dealing with the risk of food allergies and intolerences
As part of risk assessment you should be aware that individuals can have food allergies or an intolerence to particular ingredients. It is important to find out about such cases from parents/guardians - not just in relation to working with food in school, but so that the school is fully informed and can meet its responsibility towards children with these needs. One particular case is that of nuts. The activities and recipes in this pack avoid all use of nuts because of the fatal reaction which some individuals have to this ingredient.

Children should be taught about the dangerous reactions which some people have to nuts and ways in which this risk can be managed. You should make your own judgements about whether avoiding use of nuts altogether is a necessary precaution in your particular school. If in doubt, leave them out and be vigilant - even traces of nuts, egs. when food is contaminated by coming into contact with nuts and nut oils, can cause an adverse reaction.

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Food safety and hygiene policies
Schools usually address food hygiene and safety issues within their general school policy on health and safety, so this should be your first point of reference. Any policy should be straightforward and clear to those who will implement it. It should also refer to the legal and liability issues that apply under the Food Safety (General Food Hygiene) Regulations, 1995. In line with all other aspects of school health and safety practice, teachers undertaking food activities should be prepared to make a first line response should the need arise, ie. knowing the school policy and procedure for dealing with egs. burns, scalds, electric shock, allergic reactions, cuts, choking, poisoning.

Preparing the classroom for food activity
Primary schools do not usually have a specialist room for food work. Wherever food work is taking place, there should be established routines:

It is good practice to involve children in maintaining these procedures, so that they learn to recognise them and take responsibility for them. It is useful to evaluate safety and hygiene practice regularly with children, considering whether routines are efficient, whether they reduce risk, whether the routines are being properly used or whether they could be improved.

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Personal hygiene and safety
When working with food teachers should ensure that children:

Routines and procedures should include:

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Food tasting
Practical food work should involve children tasting, testing and evaluating foods. Particular care should be taken with safety and hygiene in planning and carrying out such activities.

Good rules to follow are to:

Involving parents and community
Parents could be involved in a whole range of food-related work in school and might welcome the opportunity to take part in the classroom and to support and learn alongside children. There are many levels on which they can take part, egs. as classroom helpers; shopping for ingredients; collecting food packets and food magazines; accompanying children on visits. Find out if any parents work in the food industry and could talk to the children about their work.

Make contact with your community dietician who is a local source of information and advice on diet and health. They may be able to assist you with the planning or to come in and work alongside the children. They could also become involved with extra-curricular activities to which childrenŐs relatives are also invited.

In the same way, local food and consumer related businesses may be willing to lend their support to food activities in school. This might be by donating ingredients and resources for food activities, arranging for groups of children to visit and learn about their business or talking to children about their work. Find out if any of the school governors have connections with food-related businesses and enlist their support.

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Teaching nutrition
Nutrition is an important part of understanding food. Eating healthily involves applying knowledge about food and nutrition when selecting the foods we eat. Children need to be taught to apply this understanding of nutrition when working with food in schools. Although food is a substance that can be made into things to eat and enjoy, it also has a nutritional function which should be considered.

Concepts about nutrition can be introduced in schools wherever opportunities arise within the curriculum (egs. through science, PSHE and D&T). The following can be used as a guide to develop nutritional understanding in primary schools.

Children should:

What is balanced eating?
Balanced, or healthy, eating is about ensuring that individuals eat the right combinations of a variety of foods that provide the necessary nutrients for their dietary and lifestyle needs.

The Health Development Agency, in association with the DEFRA and the Department of Health, has produced guidelines which should be incorporated into teaching about healthy eating:

The key message is that balanced eating can be achieved by selecting food carefully over a period of time, rather than on any one particular day. There are no 'good' or 'bad' foods, only 'good' or 'bad' diets.

To help people understand about balanced eating and apply the above guidelines a scheme called 'The Balance of Good Health' has been devised. This uses a diagram of a plate to show the proportions of the different basic food groups that people are advised to eat. Information about this may be found at www.food.gov.uk and also at www.nutrition.org.uk

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