Breakfast for Kindergarten schoolgirls in Pakistan

Three months ago, our team sat down to re-assess the menu for the breakfast we serve to our Kindergarten students at SMB Fatima Jinnah Government Girls School. Our goal was to ensure that every breakfast our students eat is nutritious, delicious and efficient to prepare and serve.

We got rid of things like French fries and muffins from the regular menu and decided to avoid foods high in sugar and refined flour in the future. We also replaced bakery bread with home-made whole-wheat chapati (flatbread) where possible, to ensure students get adequate fibre in their diet and avoid the inevitable mid-day sugar crash. To keep a balance between savoury and sweet breakfasts, we drafted various preparations of chickpeas and other beans such as curries or salads with seeds, grilled vegetables and vegetable sandwiches. It was also decided that we would try homemade jams and sweeten porridge with fruits instead of with sugar.

In the months of April and May, our tiny tots in the KG section enjoyed chapati, sweet porridge, spicy porridge, boiled chickpeas and vegetable sandwiches from the new menu. They also had milk every day, as usual. They enjoyed all the new additions, though it took them a while to get used to vegetables or jam rolled up in chapatis instead of in  sandwiches. Their parents also appreciated the changes.

April was the beginning of our new term, which meant a brand new class of Kindergarten 1 got introduced to school breakfast (not common in Pakistani schools) for the very first time.The parents of these new students were blown away by the breakfast program and were all praises for it.

Overall, a total 263 students were served a daily breakfast in the last three months. We at Zindagi Trust are fully committed to serving students a healthy and nutritious menu and are constantly trying to improve it. Please share any suggestions you may have for nutritious breakfast ideas and keep supporting our program.

Links:

• our website

We fed a daily breakfast to more than 250 kindergarten students at SMB Fatima Jinnah Government Girls School in Karachi. The menu remained the same as the last quarter, featuring a tall glass of milk along with one of the following: fruit salad, potato cutlets, French toast, bread with jam and butter, eggs, sandwiches, wheat porridge, pancakes, sweet porridge, chick peas, and boiled potatoes.

Dr Seema Hassan (MD, MPH, CPH), a doctor specializing in public health and nutrition evaluated our menu to review the nutritional value of the food offered to the students. She has proposed certain changes, such as introducing wheat porridge and using homemade jams instead of store-bought ones loaded with preservatives. She also urged us to check the ingredients list of all packaged items such as oil, spices and butter to prevent the use of unwanted additives and guard against contamination. Earlier, our management urged upon the school to avoid refined floor products such as biscuits and sugary cereals. These changes will be incorporated at the onset of the new academic year starting April.

The Sindh province is plagued with malnourishment and stunting, which is one of the reasons for our introducing the breakfast program at a public school. To determine the impact of the breakfast as well as of the changes in the menu, we measured the baseline weight and height of the students in August. A follow-up was taken this month and the endline weight and height record has shown a considerable improvement in the health and growth of our youngest students.

The class teachers and the section incharge get regular feedback from the parents of the kindergarten students, as they come to school to pick up their children every day. In general, the parents have given a great positive response to the new breakfast items being served at school and have noticed an improvement in the overall eating habits of their children. They are thankful to donors like you who make this breakfast program possible!

Links:

• Our website