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  • I went online and looked for family style dining videos,

  • a few.

  • I could find a few for early childhood environments.

  • But they weren't just like ours because the children bring in their own lunches.

  • How do you do family style if you have your own lunch? So, we said well we are

  • going to take everything out. Put our lunch box under our chair

  • and let the child see everything that's there and choose what he or she

  • will eat first. And put that food on a plate.

  • You can visualize your portions better. You can talk about half should be fruits and vegetables.

  • Before the children were just eating out of little baggies and containers.

  • So that's how we made it more family style.

  • We started passing napkins and utensils during lunch time.

  • Pass the napkins, use your manners, self-control. Be a part of the meal.

  • And a big move was having the staff sit down, the

  • teachers sit with the children. They weren't sitting with them. And the teachers said we can't

  • sit with them. We have too much to do. It takes too long. So it's a process,

  • you need to allow more time at the beginning and now the teachers love sitting

  • with them. It's a great time to hear the conversation, you know

  • what the kids have to say. At that time, they talk about what they brought in to eat.

  • Teacher: Anybody eat any vegetables like broccoli?

  • You ate broccoli? What's in your

  • hand? You're hiding food from me? Family style eating,

  • teaching the kids, learning myself how to support the kids

  • in that. How each step of that process

  • is important. Taking the napkin by themselves and

  • serving themselves the food and pouring their own drink.

  • That whole process is so much smoother now that I've learned how to do it.

  • Each teacher has a different way that they do

  • it with different age children.

  • I'm just finding that my kids are so much more capable

  • than I thought, even in terms of that.

  • In terms of coming up and being able to

  • pour themselves a drink. It's amazing what they're able to

  • do once you learn how to teach them how to do it.

  • I was concerned about which way to go. Should I,

  • you know should I put everything on the table and just let them go.

  • Should we pass it all in a circle? Once I

  • realized that it actually doesn't matter as long as I pick

  • a way and do it and stick to

  • the routine. We can grow from there. Chris

  • has supported us in that in getting us the right size bowls and the right size tongs,

  • the right size water pitcher. That's been really helpful

  • in making that happen.

  • Family style dining, we do that

  • in our classes for snack.

  • The children pass around bowls of food and they serve

  • themselves. We teach that to parents, that children are more likely to

  • eat healthy foods and a variety of foods and try new foods if

  • they're serving themselves. So that's something that we talk about all the time. them take

  • Put a bowl of broccoli on the table and let them take it.

  • Introduce new foods and let their

  • children know when we do this in class as well.

  • Smell it, touch it, because that's a part of tasting too, what it smells like, and feels like.

  • What it looks like. Even if they take a lick,

  • then that's considered tasting and that's a first step. Maybe next time

  • they'll take a tiny bite and that is what happens and we see that. So we do that in school,

  • but we also teach that to parents so they can try it at home. Because

  • right away they will tell us that you know my child won't eat that. But if

  • they try some of these strategies, we find that it really works. We

  • talk about family style dining and how it's important that the children are serving themselves

  • or passing napkins or getting plates. And what we see often, which I

  • understand is, it takes a long time for children to

  • pass and to serve themselves. So as adults,

  • we tend to want to rush. So what I see is, if a child is struggling,

  • or not even struggling, but just taking a while or they're picking up pairs

  • of tongs and they miss. And they are doing it again and they're missing. So teachers

  • might take it and say here I'll do it for you. Because they want to rush it along

  • because that's what we're used to, rushing, rushing. And I can't tell you

  • how many children have said to me, or I've heard, not necessarily to me,

  • but sometimes to me, especially my son, "You're rushing me." Because that's what we

  • tend to do. Children do not rush. They don't have a

  • sense of time the way we do. They're not in a hurry. And so that's

  • something that we're continuing to teach and

  • hopefully model to other teachers that it's ok, this is all part of

  • the process. And that if it takes 5 minutes to pass napkins around,

  • let them take the time. Don't do it for them. Because that's what we see, we see

  • teachers tend to grab and just kind of do it for them. In our,

  • when we teach classes we have half an hour. So sometimes we have to make choices.

  • So we may pass around the napkins, but then let them serve themselves the food.

  • So you do have to make choices. But that I think is probably one of the biggest struggles

  • for teachers, just standing back and not doing it for them.

  • Because that's what as adults we are used to doing everything for children. And here

  • we're saying, let them do it. Because then they're more likely to eat

  • different foods, try different things. If we're teaching the children

  • about maybe it's about passing, the bowl of food.

  • That's what we'll explain to parents that your,

  • every one of the children, they put this, they

  • squeeze the hummus on their plate and they dip the broccoli in

  • and they all tasted it. So these are the same parents that might say they will not eat that.

  • But they did. They ate it for us. So why are they eating it for us?

  • Of course, they have other children around, so that's encouraging them. But

  • what's the difference? The difference is they're serving themselves. The difference

  • is there is no pressure and we tell this to parents.

  • Each classroom receives

  • serving utensils with the appropriate serving amounts on them,

  • so they know which utensil to use.

  • Different serving pitchers, serving bowls, the

  • children receive forks, spoons.

  • And I go down and I monitor

  • three times a year, the preschool age children, to ensure

  • that they are following the family style dining rules

  • and procedures. You know, make sure

  • the teachers are modeling the food components. And the children

  • are serving themselves. You know, friendly positive

  • atmosphere. With the family style dining,

  • the times that I have monitored, I have seen the children

  • and they each sit in groups at maybe three or four

  • tables in the classrooms, all with appropriate adult supervision

  • at each table. The children engage in conversation

  • amongst the group sitting there.

  • They serve themselves which allows them to

  • feel a little more independent, I think. And to kind of judge

  • what an appropriate portion is with the proper serving utensil

  • they've been given. Well, we are like a family

  • here in CentroNia. So that's the way we treat all children.

  • So we start with them, greeting them in the morning when we come

  • into the classroom. Doing a little dance, that's a good morning

  • with them. Later, we go wash our hands and then we walk to the table. We have

  • a job chart where they all have a job in our classroom.

  • Some of them clean the table, other ones are the one

  • who puts the plates, the other ones are the ones who pass the food.

  • Then we sit down together to eat all as a family. There at the table we talk

  • about things that happened at home or things that we're going to do in school.

  • Sometimes children's parents work

  • and they're not at home. So they don't have the opportunity to

  • share the communication, the talking

  • part. So, sometimes they just eat on the sofa or they

  • just eat at the table or they eat by themselves.

  • They are very happy to share

  • their experience, sharing what's going on even in the classroom.

  • They share things that happen at home. That's a

  • way as a teacher to know what's going on and how

  • we can help them.

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  • It's just a beautiful process.

  • It's basically, that's another thing, educating the adults.

  • I think the main thing is to give

  • the food the importance it has in life,

  • you have to take time to eat. Not to eat very quick to

  • go to take a nap. Then that is the, you have to

  • take more time to eat with the children. Then it

  • basically goes through the same thing. Children will do whatever you think that is fun.

  • If you say, oh this is much more fun to do it this way. Children will do

  • it. It's to educate the adults. Like I say, you have to compromise the

  • teachers to do this. You have to sell the

  • idea to them. At first it was like we don't have enough

  • bowls, put the food there. It has been a process

  • and I have seen the improvement, immensely.

  • And it's such a lovely thing to see how much the children were serving, how

  • much they learn how what are they wanting to eat.

  • And also gives them empowerment to eat, "This is what I want to eat,"

  • you put a little bit, but I want more of this. Then it's a very

  • important process for children. And I

  • think teachers are aware of that now and are practicing.

  • And it's just taking more time and making it a little more fun to eat.

  • Which we have lost here somehow. We think we don't

  • have time to eat. And I'm like what? What do you mean you don't have time to eat?

  • You have to eat in front of a computer. How does that work? I mean it's like...

  • It's because culturally in this country we lost that. We are very

  • busy people who...

  • don't take the time to eat and that makes it completely... but then I think

  • that if we make changes when they are young, that is going to be

  • an impact on their entire life.

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