Food Stays At The Table: How To Choose Your Battles And Adjust The Environment

I feel like a broken record. “Food stays at the table!”

I want to share a simple change that made a huge different in our home.

Our Little Nugget had a hard time keeping her food at the table. She really liked watching Trolls and eating snacks at the same time. Each time she did this I brought her and her food back to the table and reminded her, “food stays at the table.” As soon as I was not looking, she wandered back to the couch by the TV. It may seem like a silly battle to choose, but I really didn’t want her to eat on the couch. I was hoping to avoid stick and crumby cushions.

When a child is having difficulty changing her behavior, try changing the environment. 

Duh. Move the furniture. All she wants is to watch TV while eating snacks. I don’t have a problem with her eating and watching TV at the same time, but I do have a problem with food on the couch. I need to pick my battles.

I decided to rearrange the table and chairs just a bit so that she could see the TV from her chair. Now, she could see the TV while eating food at the table. No longer would Little Nugget be forced to make the agonizing decision between Trolls or Goldfish, Dora or Nutragrain Bar, Veggie Straws or Moana. She can have BOTH at the SAME time.

But did it work?

Yes! It did!

With my bio-children, we taught them to keep food on the table from an early age, and there was never a struggle. These babies probably didn’t have that rule before, so they were having difficulty remembering it at our house. They were having a hard time changing their behaviors to meet my expectations.

Did I want her to watch TV all the time? No.

Did I want to encourage even more TV watching? No.

But I chose to be flexible. 

When the family eats meals together, we turn off the TV. There is no resistance because we are all there talking and laughing together. The problem was really only when she was eating a snack and no one else was sitting at the table with her to keep her company. 

Picking your battles is a piece of advice I hear often. This is a perfect example. The battle I picked was keeping crumbs off my furniture and food at the table.

If we as parents or teachers try applying the “change the environment” technique rather than jumping straight to “change the behavior” more often, we may have better compliance.