Another reason parents should consider prioritizing family meals, is to teach good table manners. Even YMCA camps are complaining that campers have no table manners. Think about it. If you aren’t sharing meals together, who is to tell children that it isn’t polite to chew or talk with your mouth open. Have you ever visited your childs school lunch room? Marilyn Pentel visited her grandson's school and later developed a course, Mannerly Manners , that instructs children in the ABCs of etiquette.


"It's harder to get the basics because parents don't have time to put the effort in. I call it 'the drive-through generation,' " says Pentel. "Families are constantly juggling. You're in the car a lot, you're not sitting at the table anymore, you're eating in the car. The world has changed, so we need to change and evolve when it comes to teaching manners." Read more of the St. Paul Pioneer Press article.


Find a night to host your own formal dinner party. Pick a date, write the invitations, but limit the invites just to your immediate family. Let the kids get involved by setting out a linen table cloth, the fine china, all the silverware you can find, some candle sticks, experiment with napkin folding, etc. Most well known cookbooks have a chapter on the basics of table setting or search the internet. The Old Farmer's Almanac offers some basic tips.

Posted by Susan at 8/08/2004 11:52:36 PM | Link