Why are there more eating opportunities for kids now than in the past?

@nvmomketo I think you are right. I do not remember *candy* being a part of our snacks. As a child, I would have half (or 1/3 of) a banana for a snack after school. Sometimes, I would have an apple, orange, berries (whatever happened to be in season at the time). I never considered candy a snack, but a "special treat" that kids earned for Christmas, or something offered at weddings. Then again, special treats for me were Apples with cinnamon, fresh pineapple right out of the peel, or cantaloupe with homemade light topping (plain yogurt, but I didn't know this at the time Granola bars were considered a meal on busy days, and seeing how the macros stack up, I can kind of see why. I didn't consider myself an active child, I was mostly on academic teams; however, my father made me go play outside after school (tag, hide and seek, dodge ball, double dutch etc). Candy during an athletic game seems like a bad idea.

I think a lot of the prevalence of snacks can be attributed to the much busier schedules and longer days out of the house that are common for children today. I'm a working mom of 2 boys, ages 4 and 7.

My kids eat breakfast at home around 7am. We leave for the before care program at school at 8 am. They can eat free breakfast at school at 9 am if they choose (they usually do). After that, lunch is at 12:30 pm. Without that second breakfast, they would have 5.5 hours between breakfast at home and lunch. Their lunch period is 18 minutes. That includes the time to get about 100 children from grades PreK to 1st grade into the lunch room, seated, open their lunches (little ones often need help opening bottles of water and sandwich bags) and eating. My kids rarely finish their lunch and I've been there watching them shoving the last of their sandwich in their mouths as they are ushered out for recess. The 4 year old does get an afternoon snack at school, the 7 year old does not. They both get a snack at their after school child care programs. I pick them up around 5:30 and we rush to get to baseball practice or game. If they say they are hungry then, I let them share a bag of animal crackers or something. By the time we get done with practice or the game, and get home, it's 7 pm and we still have to cook and eat dinner, do homework, take baths, and read before bed at 8:30.

That is an incredibly long day for all of us and I can't imagine making it through without all of those snacking opportunities.