Hi everyone! I'm curious how each center handles snack. Could you please help me by sharing your snack procedures?
Do you provide snacks or do parents bring them each day?
If you provide snacks, do you have a staff person specifically for snack shopping, prep, and delivery to rooms?
If you provide snacks, do you charge a snack fee or just build it into tuition?
Do you have any amazing creative snack procedures to share? =) Do you have any products that you LOVE for family style snack?
Thanks!!
Hi Tiffani! We provide snack each morning and charge a snack fee ($10-22 per month depending on how many days a week your child is registered). It used to be a part of tuition, but in an effort to track spending better, we made it a separate line item. I shop monthly at Costco, then each week at the grocery store for fresh things like fruits and veggies. We have the EMPOWER grant from AZ, so we have to do some specific things to make that work.
Snack is served family style at their classroom tables, with bowls or plates, and spoons or forks that children use to grab their portion. Each day's snack has at least a carb, dairy, veggie/fruit, or protein. I have a monthly snack schedule that we try our best to follow, that then I rotate in different things to try each month. We are lucky and don't have a ton of allergy issues right now, so we only need to accommodate a little bit, and it's not difficult to avoid strawberries and pickles. :) Next year will be a little tricky as we have a student enrolling with celiac, so her parents will be asked to bring her snack every day and I'll waive their snack fee. That helps me not have to worry about cross-contamination and they can better control what their daughter has for snack. Airborne isn't an issue with us at all right now.
I hope that helps! Here's my March snack calendar.
---Annie