WELLBEING TALK
Family Meal Conversations Starters
Between work and our children’s extracurriculars, it can be hard to find quality time together and things like family dinner tend to fall down our priority list. However, sharing a meal and conversation together can be far more powerful than we may realise.
Dinner is a great time for your child to talk about their day. If they are feeling stressed, keeping the conversation light and discussing things they like can help to improve their mood. It is great to encourage your child to express themselves and discuss their feelings as early as possible.
By stepping away from technology or turning off the TV in the background, we can help support children to focus on the conversations and be present at the dinner table. And if your child is struggling with their homework schedule, regular dinners can be a welcome break.
Now don’t get me wrong, my family and I absolutely have nights in front of the TV or independently working, so I am not saying this needs to happen every night. Instead, we should try to aim for family dinners to become our regular routine and allow ourselves nights that differ.
The Family Dinner Project has the following information on their website, which I think is extremely insightful:
'Dinner table conversation has special qualities that make it different from talk we have at other times such as while carpooling or while tucking kids in at bedtime. Research indicates that, on average, children bring up about six different topics at dinner, so conversation tends to be interesting and varied. Also, families who eat together expect that children will sit and talk for more than a few minutes and each topic usually gets input from several members, so there are multiple viewpoints expressed. This exposure to multiple points of view engages kids in complex thinking and can encourage tolerance for opinions different from one’s own.
Focusing on certain types of conversations, particularly narrative conversation, or the telling of stories, can be particularly helpful. Helping kids tell stories that include their thoughts and feelings rather than just the facts is associated with greater wellbeing. Research shows that children who know a lot about their parents’ own childhood and family histories will become more resilient – the capacity to bounce back from the slings and arrows that life throws at each of us and better able to learn from adversity, continuing to face ourselves and each other with optimism. Who doesn’t want that for their children? Many researchers have also found that children who learn a lot about their families had higher self-esteem and see themselves rather than others as responsible for their own behaviour'.
You might be rolling your eyes thinking about how often you receive one-word replies. This is where conversation starter sheets may come in handy. An example conversation starter sheet is attached which includes a number of prompts. You may like to print this off and place it on the fridge for those days where it feels impossible to start a deep conversation. If you are looking for further prompts, the Family Dinner Project have an extensive list categorised by age. https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/category/conversation/conversation-starters/
As a general rule of thumb, try to avoid asking questions that can be answered by one word. So, instead of ‘did you have a good day at school today?’ Try ‘what subjects did you have at school today?’ This has the ability to change an answer from one word (good) to an extended response. After all, dinner time is the perfect time to connect with meaningful conversation. With work, school and all of the other activities families have going on, dinner time is often the only time we have quality time together to communicate on a daily basis.
Linda Schembri | CatholicCare Counsellor