Kenwood Elementary

Cafeteria Expert Weighs In: How to Prepare Your Child for School Lunch

Pam Ketch is about to begin her 30th year as an Educational Assistant with CMCSS. She has gone through many school lunch hours and has some advice for our new and returning elementary families! Thank you for sharing your insight, Pam!

🍽 👛 Buying School Lunch in the Cafeteria

Each student is given several choices, and the kitchen staff will ensure they receive the appropriate amount of food, per USDA guidelines. Ensure your child can clearly pronounce their first and last name, even though some schools use scannable cards. This helps the line move faster and gives all children more time to sit and eat. Once seated, cafeteria staff do not monitor if children eat their entire lunch!

If you believe your child qualifies for Free and Reduced Lunch, fill out the application ASAP on schoolcafe.com.

‼️ Allergy Awareness ‼️

It is very important that your child's teacher and the kitchen staff are aware of any allergies. You will list allergies on their beginning-of-year forms through PowerSchool. You should also go online under your child’s lunch account to find out more about notifying staff of your child's allergies.

🍦 Ice Cream and Chips

If you want your child to be able to purchase ice cream or chips from the cafe, you will need to add extra money to their account or ask your teacher if it is okay to send money with them to school. Any money should be placed in an envelope or Ziploc bag with their full name and teacher’s name on the outside. Please write “ice-cream money” on the outside, too.

🍎🍛 Packed Lunch (Home Lunch) Students

Families want to ensure their child has plenty of choices in their lunchbox, but be mindful of what your child may realistically eat during lunch, and possibly a snack at some point in the day. It is not uncommon for children to eat their sugary items first... no matter how many times you encourage them to eat their protein and fruit first!

🥛 Examples of Things Your Child Should Be Able to Open:

Ziplock bags
Chip bags
Lunchables
Plastic wrap containers like Little Debbie-type cakes, fruit snacks, juice box straws (they open in the middle), and ketchup packets.
Water bottles and Gatorade bottles

➡ Pro-tip! Teach them the pinch-and-pull method for plastic and chip bags. If you think it may be difficult for them to open, have them practice at home before the first day of lunch. This is especially helpful with juice boxes and juice pouches!

🍱 Bento Boxes
Practice opening and closing all the containers. This saves you from a messy lunchbox at the end of the day because cafe aides cannot close all Bento lids between lunch transitions!

👩‍👧👨‍👦 Eating Lunch with Your Child

Learn about your school's policy for eating lunch with your child. Your teacher or the school admin team can share the school's policy. Due to size, space, and seating availability, each school handles lunch visitors differently.

Remember, the cafeteria is busy! Students have only about 30 minutes to eat lunch, and we want to ensure they have time to get in, get seated, and start eating. Please understand that at any given time, there can be 200-250 students (maybe more) eating their lunch in the cafe, with 2-4 adults monitoring. If you have time to volunteer as a cafeteria monitor, ask your school how to get involved!

HAVE A GREAT SCHOOL YEAR!

🏫 Don’t forget to join us for Open House tonight from 5:00–7:00 p.m.! We can’t wait to welcome our Kenwood Knights and families back to school! 💛🖤

Tomorrow is our first half day of school. Please pay close attention to the dismissal times listed in the image below.

We also ask for your patience and grace as students, families, and staff learn our arrival and dismissal procedures. ⏰ Please help us get the year off to a great start by arriving promptly and on time. We’re excited to see everyone!

Good afternoon Kenwood families,
Hello and happy August! It is hard to believe that summer has almost come to a close and we are ready to start a new school year, but we are really excited.

For our new families, welcome to Knight Nation! You are now a part of a wonderful school campus that is here to support you and your students. I send a weekly newsletter every Sunday at 4:30 full of information you can use to stay connected.

Thank you to everyone who heeded the call to pick up car/walker tags on Friday. We already gave out over 150! This will certainly help limit lines at Open House on Tuesday night. Yes, you may still pick up any transportation tags there. We do ask that the tag be secured to your student's backpack. This will help ensure we get all students home properly as we are all getting back into a groove. If you would like to come by the office between 9-2 tomorrow to pick up tags, you may do that as well. Tags are new this year, so any tags from last year will not be validated.

We cannot wait to see you all at Open House on Tuesday night from 5-7. You will have the chance to meet your child's teacher(s), register for free and reduced lunch, tour the school, turn in registration docs (if needed), and explore extra curricular and community opportunities. Join us at 4:30 in the cafeteria for a KES 101 meeting and Title 1 meeting.

It’s tax free weekend and we wanted to share our school supply lists one more time. 😃

🏰💛 Kenwood Family, we need your help! 💛🏰

👉 Vote here: https://clarksvillesbest.com/vote/

Click Education, choose Best School, and vote for Kenwood Elementary! ⭐

You can vote once every 24 hours through August 12, so every daily vote makes a difference.

Thank you for believing in our students, supporting our staff, and being part of our incredible Kenwood community. Let’s bring home the title together! ⚔️🖤💛

🚗✨ New school year, new tags! ✨🚶

Before your Knight rolls through the car line or walks home, be sure to pick up a new car or walker tag tomorrow, Friday, July 31, from 9:00 a.m.–2:00 p.m.

Please remember: Last year’s car tags have officially retired! 🏰 Stop by and grab your new one before school begins.