The first trick of family dinner is getting the family together. We try to eat around the same time each night, and at the same place (around our dining room table). I think consistency is key. Kids don’t eat at the kitchen counter, or up in their rooms. Even if you aren’t hungry, you still join the family at the dinner table.
This was a phrase my mother invented, and she used it often at our dinner table when I was growing up. Dinner time is sacred, and only nice things are said at the table. You may want to remind your son to clean up his room, but wait until after dinner. Siblings don’t bicker, parents don’t lecture. The table is a safe place.
For adults this means: No newspapers. No magazines. No phones. No laptops, etc. For kids: No legos or other toys. No books. No homework. If the phone rings, just let it ring. (This rule is sometimes harder for
the adults than the children!)
We use our best manners at the table. We say please and thank you. We ask for things instead of just grabbing them. Dinnertime is the perfect place to teach children the correct way to behave at meals, in fact my
mom used to read us a page from Miss Manners during dinner each night.
Granted this may not be necessary if you don’t have small children, but all four on the floor refers to the legs of your chair: All four legs need to remain on the floor at all times. It’s hard to have a conversation with someone who is rocking back and forth as they eat (and my kids need to be reminded a few times each meal).
So you don’t like broccoli, that’s okay. Forcing kids to eat food they hate is a game I don’t enjoy playing. But we do ask our kids to try a bit of everything on the table, it can just be a bite or two. I want them to learn to be polite about food, and learn to try things that seem a little scary.
The dinner table is a great place to talk about all the busy details of your day, but not the place to YELL about it. We need to remind our 5-year-old Bee about this quite frequently, as she often has exciting news to report. We’re all for talking, but it needs to be with a quiet voice.
One of the requirements of dinner at our house is “High and Low”. We take a minute to go around the table and everyone shares their high point and low point of the day. I love hearing about the kids high points, but the low points are even more interesting.. they share things I sometimes wouldn’t hear about any other way. Often someone doesn’t have a low point to share, in that case, you share two high points.
It’s hard to spend an hour making dinner and then hear a chorus of “But I don’t like shrimp!” I try to make dinners I know my kids will want to eat, but I also like to try new things, which means that every once in a while, dinner is a flop. We’re trying to teach our kids to be kind to the person who made dinner, so we ask them to keep quiet, eat the things they like at the table, and if they’re still hungry after dinner they can grab a slice of bread or some fruit to hold them over until breakfast.
The person who cooks is never left alone to clean up. The kids clear their plates as they leave the table, and everyone grabs a few more things and takes them into the kitchen. Lately we’ve been trying to wash the dishes really quickly so we have time for a walk around the neighborhood after dinner. Good motivation to get dinner cleaned up so we can get out the door.
Do you have rules at your house for dinner? I’d love to hear them, so please share.
This is wonderful, I will have to bookmark this for the future. Thanks for sharing. 🙂
These rules were basically exactly the rules my parents had growing up. A nice reminder for when I have kids of my own. 🙂
With boys, I had to institute a “no burping or farting at the table” rule! We often played 20 questions, or other trivia games during dinner, not with a board or pieces, just something to get everyone (5 of us) involved in creative thinking or something educational and fun.
My children are now 21, 19 and 17. These were our rules for many, many years. We even did “High/Low” (although we didn’t have that great name for it). Not only did it get the conversation started, but it also gave us insight into what made these kids tick!
You should make a poster out of this. I’d buy it!
I love the “Only complements to the chef” rule!
Although the notion of “rules” is not exactly appealing to me, the contents are just fantastic! so in spite of my reservations I may make these mine one day.
The really tricky thing here is to educate my husband first… My rules would be phrased something like: Not to make faces or sounds to less appealing food (I cannot tell how frustrated I feel when we have veggies salad or spinach pie and he moos), Not to flee the scene once the last bite was swallowed, Turn off the damned radio or tv already (fortunately we don’t own a telly, but he does glue his eyes when we’re eating with in-laws).
The high and lows sound really, really good to me. I didn’t have those growing up and my memories of family meals aren’t very exciting.
Thank you for sharing!!!
These are wonderful rules, I am going to implement the Four on the Floor tonight! Growing up the only two rules we had at the tables were 1) Two bites of everything on your plate and 2) No criticizing the chef (aka mom). those two rules have carried over to my dinner table with a few others (We have Best and Worst instead of High and Low) and they seem to work well.
Oh man, great stuff…Who can whip up a silkscreen poster of these? I want one! They are similar to what we ask for around our table, but the language is clear, kind and succinct.
Thank You!
We also have the rule/custom that in addition to not complaining about whatever mom and/or dad cooked, we always say a genuine “Thank you” to the chef(s) for cooking. Even my 2 year old son does it. Thanks for the great list.
I grew up with asking, “May I please be excused.” We struggle to enforce rules with the 2y.o. and even keeping technology away goes out the window when daddy is gone for days at a time, and is available to skype!
I love these rules and the simple powerful way you display them. Truly wonderful! I love the “Only Compliments to the Chef” rule. I sometimes find the chef himself/herself (since we both trade cooking) tends to be the most critical of the meal, and I try to bite my own tongue so I don’t model being critical to the kids.
Alison: I think if Daddy is only available via Skype that may be a valid reason to bend the “no distractions” rule.
No toys at the table has always been our unbending rule which fits in well with “No distractions.” But I’ll admit that my husband and I frequently have the NYTimes Sunday crossword between us at the table. In our defense, we get the kids involved with helping us figure out the answers. I figure if we’re all doing it together, maybe it doesn’t count as a distraction? And we could be raising a couple of crossword champs, in the bargain.
Great suggestions, all of them. So glad there is still a critical mass of people out there trying hard to have dinner together every night. Well done.
Maybe a silly question – are you explicit with your kids that there are 10 dinner rules? or are these merely instructions that you repeat until they understand they are rules. We have a 2 1/2 year old and I’m trying to figure out how you instill the fact that things are rules…. thanks!
I love #2. In my family growing up, we always ate together, but I don’t have warm fuzzy memories about it. I remember a lot of fighting, nagging & general discomfort. I like this rule because it’s an hour or so out of the day when everyone can be pleasant and have no worries 🙂 Hopefully, when I have kids, their memories will be better ones 🙂
Loved this. Displayed them to my family tonight right after we talked about our “highs and lows”.
She is really cute, I agree. I love her dad’s blog as well. Check it out if you haven’t already. He is doing a great job reminding us all to eat a little healthier each day in such a kind way.
We have a lot of those same rules at our home as well. We have three kids so one of our rules is that we have to respect everyone’s favorites. If we have Daisy’s favorite meal every night, that doesn’t leave room for Kyle’s, Abbie’s or even Mommy or Daddy. Someone is always not going to love the favorite of someone else but we have to be respectful and all get a chance to enjoy our favorites. Sadly, Mommy doesn’t run a restaurant.
This is just what our family needs. I often lecture during dinner, get upset when I hear “yuck” or “I HATE” something, and my husband tunes us all out and reads the paper or a book.
I think we might have some changes at the dinner table next week.
We raised 4 kids and my husband’s rule was “You don’t have to like it, you just have to eat it.” (akin to your take a taste of everything rule). Turns out our adult kids are much more adventurous eaters than we– they introduce us to new foods now.
Similar rules at our house, but this makes me want to print them out and post them for all to see!
Great rules! My Dad never let us eat until my Mom was seated at the table. He said (correctly), that it was rude to begin eating until everyone was seated at the table. Besides, we ate so fast we would have been done by the time Mom sat down! I think this is an important rule, that I try to implement in our house as well.
I love these, and I would also buy a copy in poster format! I’m in total agreement with Julia about not fleeing the scene! One of our major rules is that no one starts eating until everyone is at the table.
wonderful post. these are all common/unwritten rules in our house – nice to have them written down (I’ve never done this) and with a 12,11 and 7 yr old I feel like a broken record sometimes. Love #9. And right there buried in #9, my other issue. When they don’t like dinner as much, they can pick bread, fruit, but what I have more often now is hunger right before bedtime – not when I want them to eat. I say no to food right before bed but then I feel awful. Maybe its a different topic, Any tips here?
maria – I was against eating before bedtime, but my husband let it slide so I did too. we agreed that a banana or a cup of cottage cheese was fine and then he has to brush his teeth!
Maria, sometimes our dinner is quite a while before bedtime or I realize that the kids really did not “love” what I made so they did not get very full. If they do ask for something before bed then I’ll only offer unexciting things like yogurt or banana. I try to think of how hard it’d be for me to sleep with a little bit of a hungry tummy.