Do Your Kids Have Trouble Eating Lunch at School (Not Enough Time)?

If I were you, I would speak to the school. I know that they have so many children to look after and at times it has to be size one fits all but nutrition is so important with young children. Maybe a teacher or a teachers assistant can watch her at lunch time and see what is going on. If she is a slower eater then you may want to practice with her at home about eating with in certain time limit. I do not think that packing less food then she is used to eating at a meal time is a good idea.

How much time is not enough time? I think my kids get 25 minutes for lunch and another 25 for recess. Now they are allowed to go out after 15 which increases play time but that puts the blame on the kid if they don't finish their lunch.

I would look at what is going on before raising this question if she is shy she may be heading out the door with the herd instead of finishing her lunch.

We had this same issue--especially when he bought lunch..apparently after the snails all made it through the line, they had about 5 minutes to eat. I was AMAZED to see the pitched out food in the school cafeteria!
I will say, it does get better as they get older. Mine is in 3rd this year and still prefers to pack.
There's also a learning curve--once they really realize they only have "x" amount of time to eat, they get faster. Sad really, that the kids have to rush through their lunches, isn't it?

My older boys who are now 24 and 16 have gone to many different schools living the military life. They never had a problem with time. Certain schools had a problem with either quality of school lunches or J. not enough to feed a bird.

Now that my triplets have started 1st grade today, it's their first day that they've ever had lunch at school. My concern is time for them. They are only given 30 minutes for lunch including waiting in line along with all 6 first grade classes. That is not enough time! So I'm wondering how my kids will fair today, especially my very slow eating son. If time becomes a factor then I will pack him a lunch now and then so he can avoid waiting in line. I will ask them to eat faster. Thankfully they're given a 10 minute snack break mid-morning. I've J. never heard of such a short lunch period. I've always heard of 45 mins. The extra 15 minutes for line time helps! Find out how much time they give for her lunch.

If your child is shy it doesn't mean she's not interacting. She may be busy doing a lot of listening to other kids and she may not realize it. Shy kids are watchers so that may be a problem as well as if she were a talker. She could be slowly gnawing away and doing a lot of listening in a large and loud lunch room. I'd suggest to her to eat faster. Not sure if the teacher will want her to have too big of a snack since they're given short amount of time and others will want more too.

K. B
mom to 5 including triplets

Oh that's J. awful .
Poor thing.
I say do what you're doing giving her a bigger snack to help hold her over.
Then the easy quick things for lunch. You know, not much assembly
Try a smoothie in a pre packaged bottle.
Sandwich pre-made.
Wraps w/chicken, cranberries, sliced cheese. Wrapped in foil. She can
J. unwrap and eat. No assembly.
Protein bars
Fruit presliced in tupperware
Ask her exactly how lunch goes. For example, do they have to go get
their lunch bag, have far to walk to sit and eat etc. Then go from there.
Like I said, pare down "assembly". Have it pre-done: the wrap, sandwich
pre-made at home etc.
Carrot sticks, celery sticks in a tupperware w/smaller one in there w/ranch
If you get pre packed things: unwrap them & dump them into a tupperware.
Have her eat more @ breakfast if she'll eat, bigger easy snack, quick-easy-to get to-filling lunches. (add a small dinner roll (filling) either to make the sandwich or to add w/some lunch: leftovers or salad)

Last year I went and had lunch with my kid one day a week. There was a wide variety of this. Some kids eat everything. Some kids who brought lunch would quickly eat while the 'cool' kids stood in the lunch line, but as soon as they sat down, they'd stop eating. So even tho they had like 10 more minutes to eat, they didn't. While other kids would eat one or two bits of their lunch (always room for cookies and ice cream!), but while they wouldn't talk, they got caught up in the conversation/distracted and didn't finish.

We've been having the same problem. You're on the right track. So far bigger snacks and J. one thing for lunch has been successful.

I was wondering about this too.. I went today and ate with my daughter in K- this is also how it is handled at 5th grade here. They give them a set amount of time...15 minutes and then they tell them if they are done eating then they can go to recess and if they are not done they can continue to sit and eat. Well, very few hung around to "finish" they want to play outside! I dont think any of the kids finished eating but they did have the opportunity. Unfortunately they no longer do a mandatory 30 minute lunch- they mix it in with recess- well of course most kids will pick recess over finishing lunch. My daughter ate about half her lunch today- I know she would have eaten more if recess was not an option. But, she loves it and I know she will snack like crazy when she gets home. I dont worry too much about it anymore.

$20 says she's too busy talking to friends to eat.

My kids were.

I always pack 1/2 a sandwich, some fruit/veggie, and then something fun (fruit snacks or pudding or whatever). My rule is, you eat your sandwich 1st, fruit/veggie 2nd, anything else last.

They were complaining of not having enough time, so I surprised them at lunch one day. THEY HAVE PLENTY OF TIME, they J. waste that time screwing around, playing with their friends.

So, I had the cafeteria helper put them at a table by themselves for a week, until they learned to eat lunch first, talk second.

Never had a problem with that again ;)

When my son was in awayschool for K they had half an hour for lunch AND recess. It was the only recess of an 8 hour school day. Watching one day from a window NONE of the kids stayed at the table for longer than 5 minutes. Most of the food went into the garbage, because they 'checked bags' before letting the kids out at the door.

It didn't help that lunch for K was at 10am. Start at 8, lunch at 10, out at 4. Can we say *meltdowns* much?((Since my son is hypoglycemic we were lucky because he'd go to the nurse's office twice a day for chocolate milk and salami...) but there was NOT enough time for the kids to eat. Much less eat AND play.

my child is not is school yet, but I know 7 years ago when I was in high school, they would give us 30 min to eat. That included standing in line with 300 other students (they fed half the school at a time) to get the lunch, it was never enough time. I started J. skipping lunch entirely.

I would watch portion sizes. A whole apple is an adult serving, only 1/4 to 1/2 cups servings for kids. She needs to grains and proteins for it to stay with her through the rest of the day so talk to the teacher. She may need some directing during lunch to stay focused on eating too.

Some kids are slow eaters. Some kids talk a lot. If they go through a line, it can take up some of the time..

They usually learn to eat and then talk. Especially if they are hungry in the afternoon.

Is she a slow eater at home?
You may want to encourage her to eat a little faster or to eat her lunch and then visit with her friends.

15 min at that age is quick. I've seen it at my daughters' school too. Little kids are used to taking their time etc. I agree with people saying to make the snack bigger and I try to avoid foods that need a ton of chewing like raw carrots. I know they're good for you but they also take time. So I think that's the key - bigger snack and foods that are quick to eat...

Yes, my second grader is complaining about that all the time, have you been at her school at lunch? Is ridiculous ! Is not time at all.

My 5-year old daughter started kindergarten two weeks ago. She also has 25 minutes for lunch and it's not enough time for her. First she stands in line to get a milk (I pack juice for her but she always wants a milk) and then she has to sit down and open up her lunchbox. There are already 2 other classes in the lunch room when her class goes in and then 2 more classes come in while they're in there (and the first two leave at some point). I think they must have a class coming in every 10 minutes or so. Obviously, there's a lot of commotion and I think she's probably pretty distracted and has a hard time focusing on eating.

We tried school lunches the first week and that didn't go over so well (she's a very picky eater). I started packing her lunch for her last week and I let her help choose what foods she wants. Last week she was asking for bread, a slice of cheese, ham, pudding, fruit and a juice box - all packaged separately. Yes, she likes all the fixings of a ham sandwich, J. not in a sandwich form. Anyway, I checked her lunchbox one day last week and noticed that all she had for lunch was a slice of cheese and her juice box. When I asked her why she didn't eat anything else, she said it was because lunch was over and she had to put her food away and line up.

She goes into the afterschool program when school gets out and I pick her up from there when I get off work. She often has meltdowns and tantrums at some point on the way home because she is so hungry (and tired). I've even tried bringing a healthy snack for her to eat in the car but by that time she is usually beyond hungry and not able to cooperate or comprehend much. It even takes a good little while to get her to sit down to eat something when we get home but when she does she is completely different person. Once she's had something to eat she is able to listen and concentrate again.

Good luck Jen F.! Here's hoping that our kids get into their new routines and get things figured out quickly so they don't go hungry.

talk to her teacher. maybe she's taking her time or talking to other kids, etc. tell the teacher she's having trouble and see if she can tell you what/how she is eating her lunch. then maybe help your daughter with some "hints" on how to finish everything? :)

After reading some of the answers, I'm really thankful that our little ones have a half hour for lunch and a half hour for recess (maybe J. us moms know that both are critically important to developing bodies). Anyway, do you need what kinds of things she eats best (fastest)? The reason that I ask is that I gave up on the traditional sandwich and went to "finger foods" for my guys who started last week. Some things that went over well - pretzels with peanut butter dip, green beans and ranch, cinnamon toast sticks, cheese sticks, gonna try tomato + mozarella skewers this week. They usually get one "spoon" item each day - applesauce, cottage cheese, yogurt (although less success with this, probably due to 6 oz portion size). I only pack them water, because I don't want them to fill up on milk or juice. I loaded up on the reusable containers that can go in the freezer J. before school started and am trying to jot down creative ideas whenever I can - particularly if they come up with them! Some other ideas I plan to try are bagel bites with cheese and pepp plus pizza sauce for dipping, tortilla and creamcheese pinwheels, deviled eggs (one of their favs that I need to figure out how to package. I hope that this isn't J. a "back to school" high and that I stick with the creativity all year :o

Btw, they do much better this way, but they're still inconsistent. It probably helps that they have a snack a couple of hours later :)