Family Food First
Working with education settings to inspire children and families to lead a healthier lifestyle
Who are we?
We are a team of dietitians, nutritionists and health professionals who are passionate about healthy eating and promoting healthy lifestyles to children and families.
What do we do?
The Family Food First programme runs in nurseries, pre-schools and children’s centres in Luton. We aim to encourage best practice, and the promotion of good nutrition, oral health and physical activity. Early year’s settings achieve accreditation on the programme by providing good quality evidence that they are meeting the standards of best practice in the following areas:
Healthy policy and practice
All settings will have a food and health policy in place and will adopt practices that encourage children to eat well and move more.
Food and health education
Setting staff will have the appropriate level of knowledge and skills to promote healthy eating, physical activity and good oral health practice. Children will be able to learn about food, will be encouraged to eat healthier foods and will learn about keeping healthy.
Food provision
Settings that have their own kitchens will provide food that meets national food based standards.For healthy recipes that you can make in your setting and share with families, please see the Family Food First recipe book.
Working with families
Parents and carers will be supported to help make healthier choices for their children and families. Family Food First accredited settings will be a source of good quality, healthy lifestyle information and advice. Check out our guide on 10 key ways to stay healthy as a family here, and ideas for healthy party bags here.
Healthier communities
Settings will have a responsibility to promote healthier lifestyles in their community and will undertake activities to promote this. Discover a range of ideas about healthy ways you can get involved in your community here.
For more details on our standards, please review our Family Food First Standards and Guidance booklet.
Training
We currently offer free training, which includes:
- Nutrition Training- Discuss nutrition needs for children aged 0-5 years, fussy eating management and healthy celebrations.
- Physical activity- Explore purposeful physical play, government recommendations, fundamental movement skills, physical literacy and physical activity promotion.
- Starting solids- Covers when to start (developmental signs), foods to encourage, foods to avoid and exploring textures.
- Catering training- This has been designed for settings on our programme that are cook onsite. The training includes salt & sugar management, understanding food labels, understanding child portion sizes and recipe ideas & adaptions.
For the Family Food First training evaluation form, click here.
FFF approved settings register
The FFF team is dedicated to raising public awareness of early year’s settings whose practice meets our evidence based standards. These accredited settings have been formally recognized as providers of exemplary food and health education and promoters of healthy living for families within the setting and their local community. We would like to thank our settings for their continual hard work and commitment to the programme. List of accredited settings
Working together
We have developed a working together policy that stipulates the engagement and support that you can expect from us and the engagement we expect from settings that join our programme. Position Statement on Working Together - Sept 2018.
Safeguarding
We understand the importance of protecting children and keeping them safe from harm. Therefore, we respect the wishes of settings that do not permit the use of mobile phones whilst in their setting. Additionally, all members of the Family Food First team have undergone an enhanced DBS check and have attended Safeguarding training Level 2 & 3.
Contact the Family Food First team
Family Food First
Nutrition and Dietetic Service
Dunstable Health Centre
Priory Gardens
Dunstable
LU6 3SU
Tel: 01582 707400
Email: ccs.beds.familyfoodfirst@nhs.net
Check us out on social media
Additional links and information
The Family Food First team have developed a number of resources to promote healthy lifestyles to children and families.Check out our resources below, and if you require large numbers of printed resources for professional use, please complete and return our order form.
External links