What are some great family meal time activities to engage the kids?
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I let the kids “help” cook. My 18-month-old plays with the pots and pans while my 3-year-old helps measure ingredients and stir. My 3-year-old has also gotten very good at helping set the table. Helping prepare the meal makes them both feel more invested in it and more likely to sit at the dinnertable for more than 10 minutes.
As a mom of a kid, preteen, and a teen, family dinners are hugely important for us. With volleyball practices, swimming, and karate, it is a challenge to have all 5 of us gather around the table. Sometimes we go with 4 people…kind of like our family quorum!
A game that works to keep everyone’s attention from the 6-year-old through the 14-year-old, is either “What was your favorite part of the day?” or “Tell me 5 things that happened today.”
My younger kids love the game. My teen goes along, but she would rather be silent!
We’ve actually played scavenger hunts with recipe ingredients, it’s a great way to teach kids where things are in the kitchen and familiarize themselves with different foods and ingredients.
They love to help prep and cook and I find that they eat better when they are involved.
To engage kids in conversation during meals, talk about something THEY are interested in! They may not want to tell you “what they learned at school today”, but they may be eager to tell you about the new video game they want, or why the new girl in their class is gross. Be open to their world!
When our twins were just starting school, it was hard to get them to talk about how their day was. We seemed to get one word answers to any question we asked. I started a new meal time tradition to get them into a famliy conversation~~we call it ‘Best part of your day’. We each take a turn saying just that! They are learing to listen to others, and also helps them think positively about the day they have had. We have dubbed one chair at the table as the ‘hot seat’ and whoever is sitting in that must go first. The idea has been a big hit when they have friends over for dinner, or even when dad and I have our bosses or friends over to eat!
I’m a mom of 6 kids, youngest now is 13. We made a game called “high-low” they would talk about their good and bad part of the day. it helped all of us to be able to talk about not only the good things but the older kids could help the younger with advice to help their lows of the day also. it opened up the conversation to know what our kids where going through, both bad and good.
That is a wonderful “game” to play we do that with our four year old and I think it helps work her mind a bit. Then I can find out if something is bothering her as well!
Yes, really.