Online Course Catalog

This course is designed to build capacity among child nutrition professionals to standardize recipes. It provides a basic overview of standardized recipes, reasons that child nutrition professionals need to use standardized recipes, and an explanation of how to standardize a recipe. Participants will understand the key elements of standardizing recipes and the benefits to using them in their child nutrition program.

In this course, participants will gain an understanding of CACFP recordkeeping requirements and best practices, equipping them with the knowledge and tools needed to maintain meticulous records while optimizing meal service operations.

Effective medication administration is a vital responsibility for child care providers, ensuring the health and safety of children in their care. This comprehensive online course equips early childhood educators with the knowledge and skills needed to confidently and safely administer medication in a child care setting. Through eight engaging lessons, participants will explore critical topics, including legal responsibilities, the “Six Rights” of medication administration, medication classifications, preparation and procedures, accurate documentation, and strategies for managing medication errors. Additionally, the course covers the effects of medication, the proper use of emergency medications, and essential guidelines for storage, disposal, and emergency protocols. By the end of this course, learners will be well-prepared to implement best practices in medication administration, fostering a safe and supportive environment for children. This training meets regulatory requirements and supports professional development for child care providers.

CACFP Annual Training for Child Care Centers is a 3 hour comprehensive online course designed to provide annual required training for sponsors participating in the CACFP.

CACFP Annual Training for Homes is a 3 hour comprehensive online course designed to provide annual required training on meal patterns, the reimbursement process, accurate meal counts, claims submission, and recordkeeping for day care homes participating in the CACFP.

A winning meal is the key to getting great attendance and keeping kids coming to your site all summer long. While SFSP has its special challenges, in this hour our course, participants will explore exciting menu options for cold meals and hot meals. Participants will learn the SFSP meal pattern and then discover how much creativity and flexibility it has to build the best meal pattern for their needs.

Sponsors must keep full and accurate records so that they can substantiate the number of program meals that they have submitted at each claim for reimbursement. And, that SFSP funds are used only for allowable SFSP costs. This course will discuss recordkeeping requirements for sponsors including meal counts, program costs, monitoring, and training. Participants will learn and appreciate the importance of complete, well organized, and accurate records in the SFSP.

This lesson is designed for Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) institution staff to provide a review of the process and procedures of the state agency administrative review.

CACFP sponsors may need to modify planned meals in order to accommodate participants with disabilities, medical needs or special dietary needs. The course summarizes the responsibilities sponsors have when accommodating participants’ meal requests. The course also discusses medical statements, meal pattern requirements, and accommodating non-disabling special dietary needs.

SFSP sponsors who administer the SFSP have a strong commitment to the wellbeing of the children in their community. They want to serve meals to not only increase quality but to attract children to summer food sites. However, the purchasing of food, goods, and supplies can sometimes be a challenging process. This course will explore the options for buying meals in the SFSP, procurement methods, and the purchasing of local foods to maximize SFSP operations.

The course will help you understand basic procurement standards and the importance of vendor selection when outsourcing the food program. It will cover identifying and evaluating vendors based on quality, pricing and reliability. Managing the vendor contract to ensure the quality and safety of the food program will also be reviewed.

OVS or Offer vs Serve can be a challenge to introduce into your CACFP program and even harder to maintain CACFP compliance throughout menu planning and service. In this hour-long session, participants will learn the rules to OVS success, how to plan menus and prepare meals to maintain compliance, and tips for best practice when incorporating it into their centers.

The budget is the key to understanding the financial side of the SFSP. The SFSP budget helps sponsors establish goals, make decisions, and understand how program funds are generated and spent. Participants will explore the biggest expenses and sources of revenue in the SFSP and evaluate those against their budget to measure the effectiveness of their program operations. Stay on track and build a successful summer meals program!

This lesson provides information about different purchasing options available to CACFP institutions that will not only help minimize the workload and cost of planning and implementing an effective food program but also make sure that the food program is still able to offer high-quality, nutritious foods.

Is your menu feeling a little lackluster? Do you want to infuse new and exciting items into your menu while teaching children about world citizenship and other cultures? In this one hour session, participants will learn how to expand their menus through exploring new cultures and ethnic foods, resources for standardized recipes, and maintain CACFP meal pattern compliance.

Offering meals for the SFSP is a great way to ensure that children have access to meals in the summer months. But how do sponsors make sure that people are aware of SFSP sites? How do sponsors attract children and parents to summer meal sites? There are many forms of promotion and marketing that can help sponsors gain exposure. This course will discuss different ways to reach children and families by exploring forms of marketing and creative programming to build awareness and increase participation in the SFSP.

This course is designed to provide comprehensive guidance and knowledge on effective strategies and practices for attracting, selecting, and promoting the most qualified individuals within an organization. The course will explore recruitment and promotion processes and ensure the organization can build and retain a talented and diverse workforce.

Family style meal service has the opportunity to teach children so much more than just how to eat. Learn the benefits of family style meal service, best practices to incorporate it into your meal service option, and what you must do to maintain CACFP Compliance. In addition, participants will learn best practices for conversations starters around the meal table, how to encourage staff to role model positive eating behaviors, and what equipment is need for family style meal service success.

Sponsors participating in the SFSP agree to maintain the storage, preparation, and service of food with proper sanitation and health standards in ordinance with all state and health laws and regulations. Understanding the proper food safety practices is essential to a successful summer meals site to ensure that the food children consume is safe and to reduce the risk of a foodborne outbreak. This course will promote important food safety practices including good personal hygiene, food temperature and storage, and proper cleaning and sanitizing of foods. Help keep kids safe and food fresh during the summer months!

This course equips child nutrition program administrators and staff with the knowledge and skills needed to improve workplace culture. A positive workplace culture is crucial for the well-being of employees and the success of the organization. This course covers the definition and importance of workplace culture, plus strategies for improving workplace culture.

How can you make an impact to your budget and your menu in one change? Plan your menus according to the seasons. In this one hour session, participants will learn about growing seasons for different regions of the US, how to plan menus with built in flexibility for seasonality, and maintain CACFP meal pattern compliance.

Helping children get the nutrition they need for health and growth is what summer meals are all about. Creating appealing menus can help kids fuel up, have fun, and get the nutrition they need for growth and good health. This course will explore many ways sponsors can plan menus that kids will enjoy such as using local fruits and vegetables, adding variety and color, and making healthy meals fun!

This course is designed to provide effective training tips for child nutrition program staff trainers. The course will review the trainer’s role and the necessary competencies, learning styles, and effective training strategies for in-person and virtual training to enhance their training effectiveness and create a conducive learning environment.

Having excess inventory on hand can be costly, but not having enough inventory on hand can result in not serving enough food, and ultimately non-compliance and findings. In this one-hour session, learn how to calculate adequate inventory needs, while also learning how often inventory needs to be completed and best practices for stock rotation.

Program institutions and facilities receiving federal financial assistance are required to comply with federal civil rights laws to ensure all Child Nutrition participants have equal access to all benefits and services. This course will review Civil Rights regulations, and provide all information necessary to ensure that your program is in compliance with these requirements.

This course provides a comprehensive understanding of social determinants of health and their impact on health equity for children. It explores the various factors that influence health outcomes, including economic stability, education access and quality, healthcare access and quality, neighborhood and built environment, and social and community context. The course emphasizes the role of child nutrition programs, the importance of addressing health disparities, and promoting equitable opportunities for children.

What an exciting opportunity to impact children’s nutrition and health by being able to incorporate meat and meat alternates into your breakfast menu. Throughout this interactive one-hour course, participants will explore meat/meat alterations, their health benefits, and learn best practices to incorporate them into their CACFP breakfast menus.

Do you wonder how CACFP benefits the participants in your organization? Are you unfamiliar with the goal of CACFP? Are you wondering what CACFP even means? Then this is the course for you! Over the next hour, we will dig into the basics of the Child and Adult Care Food Program and how it supports children and adults each and every day.

This is a 1-hour training course designed to provide child nutrition program operators with the information they need to accommodate participants’ dietary needs as it pertains to fluid milk consumption. This training covers important topics including creditable milk types per age group and meal service, methods for accommodating special dietary requests and disabilities, and allowable fluid milk substitutions.

With Fruit and Vegetables now separate components, there are endless possibilities in incorporating great nutrition into your CACFP menus. Discover the great nutrition fruits and vegetables provide, which are the best sources of Vitamin C and A, and how often you should plan to serve them in your menus. Learn new and exciting best practices for introducing new fruits and vegetables on your menus across all meal services, as well as innovative preparation techniques.

Participants will learn behavioral strategies to motivate children to make healthy choices. Participants will understand how to be good role models for healthy eating and engage children in fun activities that inspire curiosity about food.

Basic Scratch Cooking Skills for Child Nutrition Programs is a 1-hour training course designed to provide anyone with cooking responsibilities in Child Nutrition Programs with the basic skills they need to begin preparing food. This training covers important topics including the benefits of cooking from scratch, basic knife types and knife cuts, different kinds of cooking methods, and a brief overview of developing standardized recipes and using cycle menus.

Did you know that choking is the 4th leading cause of death for children under age 5? Have you ever thought about what might be a choking hazard in your CACFP Menu? In this engaging one hour study, participants will learn common food choking hazards, explore cooking methods to prevent choking hazards, and learn best practice service methods to prevent choking in their child care setting.

This course will examine the growth and development of infants and how to make healthy food choices for infants to support this development. We will review breastfeeding, bottle feeding and introduction to solid foods. Participants will be able to select healthy menus and understand the CACFP meal patterns for infants.

Multicultural Menus: Diversifying Meals in Child Nutrition Programs is a 1-hour training course designed to provide Child Nutrition Program operators with the skills they need to incorporate regionally diverse meals into their program. This training covers important topics including the importance of providing multicultural meals, methods of implementing a taste test, and ways to adapt menus to provide a range of multicultural dishes.

Once you have the CACFP meal pattern compliance mastered, the next step in planning CACFP meals is making sure you cover all the basic nutrition needs. In this one hour session, participants will learn the importance of where the CACFP meal pattern comes from and how to incorporate basic nutrition into CACFP menu planning mastery.