OP here...a friend of a colleague toured there the other day and I guess was there when some kids were eating lunch, and noticed they were quiet and asked about it. She thought it was strange and told my colleague about it over the weekend by chance and they remembered my kid goes there.

DS is in PreK-4. He's never mentioned this and I would not have thought to ask. But he said oh yes, no talking at lunch!

Not sure if it's only for part of the time or the whole time. I'll have to ask.

I thought it seemed like a crazy rule, but this is my first kid and figured maybe I just didn't know the norms! Ha!

Is it a French school, by any chance? We have experienced this at French privates (in the USA).

A kid who is choking makes no noise at all. The school is run by idiots.

Really odd. If I were paying for that I'd be out quick.

Taught school for years. This blew me away but supported my supposition that most people will eventually go mad if they stay in K-12 education too long. Someone over thought this.

So, I support rules, even some that might appear weird to others but actually have a reasonable premise. ....but, sorry, this is kind of abusive.

Maybe an unavoidable evil if you have hundreds of kids in a lunch room, but totally unacceptable in a small private school.

Is this something that your child told you? or did it come from the administration.

Sometimes schools have a rule of quiet for the first 10 minutes so that kids focus on eating.

My son told me that they were not allowed to talk at lunch at his school and I called and spoke to the principal and it was not that they couldn't talk for the whole time, just the first 1/2 of lunch, so they would eat.

Anonymous wrote:Op didn't mention how old her child is, or what's the teacher child ratio during lunch.

Critical details, people.

Really? Pre-K is what - four years old? I don't LISTEN FOR MY CHILD TO CHOKE when she is eating with me. We talk, laugh, sing, etc.

My DD's private school also had silent lunch. Reason had nothing to do with choking. The only outside time the kids had was after lunch. The longer it took to eat, the less time outside. Quiet lunches are faster because the kids stay on task. It never bothered me.

Very strange.

Super lame.

Anonymous wrote:Op didn't mention how old her child is, or what's the teacher child ratio during lunch.

Critical details, people.

At what age or teacher-child ratio would it be appropriate to tell children that they are not allowed to talk during lunch?

Op didn't mention how old her child is, or what's the teacher child ratio during lunch.

Critical details, people.

If I were paying tuition so that my child could go to a school that did not allow my child to talk to other children during lunch, I would be upset.

My kids go to public school (MCPS) and have always been allowed to talk to other children during lunch. School is not prison.

My DS attends a private school in the area (preK through elementary). He has been there since September and we've generally liked it. Today we randomly found out that they do not allow the children to talk to each other during lunch, and if they do, they get a timeout (a timeout from what, I am not sure). Apparently this is to either prevent choking or make it so the aide who is supervising can hear if a kid is choking.

Is this typical, or strange? I believe there are 15 to 20 kids eating lunch in the room at once, at tables. I haven't had the chance to ask someone at the school about it yet.