Private school teachers eating lunch with pupils

[Catifly]

I often read on MN about teachers sitting with children to eat lunch in private schools. If you're a teacher in such a school, would you mind explaining how it works? I work in state and am so curious! By the time I've ushered the last children from my classroom and set up for the afternoon. I've perhaps got 35 minutes left. I often use most of that time for marking, especially if there's a meeting after school. Do you get a break from the children during the day? Do you get time to sit with other adults? Or is that time considered 'teaching time' and you get some time to yourself after the children's lunch hour?

When I worked in a private school there was a teachers table. Any teachers not on duty at there. The teachers in duty would eat at the end of lunch and before afternoon registration

I'm a dinner lady in a private school.
The lunchtime is quite long - about 90 minutes I think.
The kids have set times to come in according to year group etc, the teachers just come in at random times throughout the lunch period. They sit at tables apart from the kids and interaction is rare - chowing down oblivious while some of the kids act like total little shits 🤣

This used to be a thing at a state school I worked at. It was trying (unsuccessfully) to emulate Michaela. It was horrible as you had to bolt your food as only half an hour, were given set topics to discuss and generally was very stressful. Hated it.

I’m a teacher at an independent special school and we sit with the children for lunch 12:00-12:30 and are encouraged to eat with them at this time to model table manners, trying new foods etc. This time is considered teaching time although staff can eat their own lunch or ask for a small portion of the school dinner to eat alongside and then eat their own food afterwards. Some students need full support with feeding so their staff usually wouldn’t eat at this time.

The children then have a break time 12:30-1:30 and all teaching and support staff get a half hour lunchbreak, with classes managing it so half the team go at 12:30-13:00 and the other half 13:00-13:30 with the other half staying with the students.. In this time staff can go to the staff room and get time to themselves, although I can’t really use my break for classroom prep as the students will use it over that hour. Lessons resume at 1:30.

At my school (years ago) the mistresses sat at the head of the table and served the lunch. 4 girls either side of the long table. They then retired to the staff room for whatever mistresses in girls schools in the 1980s did.

DDs school is very like a mini hogwarts and they have a separate staff table. I think most of them run activities at lunch time, the children have 1.5 hrs for lunch. AT the prep site of her school it was the same as at my girls school

When I first started teaching (in mainstream) we were given a free school dinner if we ate with the children so loads of us used to-there was no staff table, we just queued up with whichever class was queueing at the time and sat down and ate with them. It was really lovely-we used to have a nice chat (and was a good opportunity to model how to use cutlery and cut up food for some of the teeny ones!)

They stopped that offer and very few staff eat with the children now. A few to buy a school meal but they take it and eat it at their desk and mark.

Sorry, not what you’d asked really but it jogged a memory-I’d forgotten all about that!

Dcs that were at private school here.

Yes lunch break is longer. All pupils go to the canteen (by year group) and teachers have their lunch there too.
Pupils usually prefer to stay together 😁😆 but I know my dcs have had some if the teachers at the same table than them. (They basically all find a place to sit where ever) They weren’t keen when they were young. Much more appreciative as they got to 6th form and it was a teacher they liked.

Lunch times in independent schools tend to be longer, which helps (though both the ones I’ve worked at have had teacher tables - in one case on a dais a la Harry Potter).
That said, I have rarely used my lunch time for work in state schools or independent. I need that break in the middle of the day to be any use in the afternoon. I teach secondary English so there’s no ‘set up’ required usually, but if there is I get the class to do it when they come in. I appreciate this might not be possible with little ones.

At 6th form (girls school closed down) the staff had a separate dining room off the main dining room. But that was a large public school with massive facilities and loads of staff

I've taught in two private schools- both in the primary phase which probably makes a difference. In one, teachers were expected to sit and have lunch with their class. We sat at long tables, so two teachers would generally sit opposite each other and the children would be at the rest of the table. We helped the children through the servery and dealt with any issues or any poor behaviour. It was a constant source of complaint that it gave teachers very little time to mark and prepare for their afternoon lessons but I suppose we did get a free hot lunch. It was pretty eye-opening at how poor most children's table manners are. The food was pretty good.

In my current school, teachers have their lunch in the dining room at the same time as the children, but we sit at a table together. We do, of course, keep an eye on what is happening and will intervene if a child needs help or there is an issue.

At my kids school there is a staff table where they can eat, and then sometimes they will sit with the children to eat.

The kids enjoy it when the teachers eat with them but I don’t know about the teachers.

Lunch break is quite long, there are early and late sittings for those attending clubs and rehearsals, as well as the main staggered by year group lunch.

I think our DCs’ school does this but only for the younger years.

All younger classes have a fairly senior TA as well as a teacher, and often a younger TA as well (18 yr olds on gap years) so it might be one of them on lunch duty not the teacher.

They also have quite a lot of specialist teachers - sport, art, drama, languages, RE, and in the older years history and geography- so the class teacher gets time when those lessons are on. I don’t know how this compares with state schools.

How interesting. I’m a teacher at a state school and I would love to improve table manners, but there is no way I’m eating the ‘food’ the kids are served. It would make me ill in no time. I actually can’t go in the hall at lunchtime, it is so horrendously noisy and messy, some children were sitting and screaming last week, seeing who could scream the loudest. I absolutely needed my lunch break away from them. There are no rules and it is absolute chaos. One of the many, many reasons my kids won’t be going to state school.

It’s not just the school’s responsibility to teach children correct table manners. Some families have shockingly low standards, it’s blatantly obvious when a ten year old can’t chew with their mouth closed, or use a knife and fork - I don’t want my kids anywhere near that type of behaviour.

SiennaMillar- you are mistaken if you think table manners are any better in private schools in my experience- although children would most definitely be picked up on the screaming. I am astounded at how few children- even at 10 and 11- can hold a knife and fork properly, sit at the table properly and eat considerately. I can only presume that most children do not sit and eat meals at the table any more and if they do their parents do not mind them eating with fingers or chewing with their mouths open.

Happens in our private school.
From year 1 on, teachers sit at a teacher table, not with the children. It’s voluntary though (but the food is free if you do it - you can’t take food out of the canteen). For reception/nursery, staff eats with the children.
Art, PE, music, drama, science are all done by specialised staff, so teachers have other non teaching times during the day (at least 1-2 hours). Lunch is one hour, and by year group so it isn’t too crazy.

When I was in private, I was teaching primary (pre-prep) and I was also a form tutor for sixth form as they were really short-staffed.

The lunch slot was 2 periods on the timetable but usually you got one unless your PPA fell on the other one. The 2 periods were to stagger lunches so everyone had an allocated time within that IYSWIM.

Every day I escorted my primary students to the dining hall, sat at the table with them and we ate together and talked (and so did the two TAs). We all had allocated tables and the children ate lunch in their forms.

One Fridays, I had to eat lunch with my primary form, escort them to the playground where the teachers on lunctime duty were watching them, then I had to hurry back to the dining room and sit with my sixth formers who had tutor lunch with me one day a week. I often had a second tutor group to catch up with as well, who I had unofficially "adopted" as their form tutor was on long-term sick. At dinner time I sat at the teacher table and it was a bit more relaxed for the students as they could choose who to sit with.

I didn't use my lunch to catch up with work, and often worked until 8pm, but living on site made that a lot easier (unless I had boarding duty, which was 2 nights and 2 mornings a week, and there was a rule that we were never allowed to do our own work while on duty and the head would patrol the corridors at random and do spot checks to make sure we were 100% focussed on the students).

I have to sit with the children. Then run a club in the second half of lunch, or have a meeting. Then I do extra-curricular after school until 5.30 on 4 nights out of 5.
I also work a half day every weekend (boarding). Evenings eg parents evenings, events etc are on top of this.
Marking and planning happens in the evenings and the day at the weekend I'm not working, as I have as heavy a teaching load as I did in state sector. I also have to mark 4 times more often per pupil than I did in state, and teach almost as many pupils (classes of 24 instead of 30).
My contract agrees that I waive working time limits. I get a 20 minute coffee break in the morning which is my 'break'.
I've worked in 3 independent schools, 2 were like this. The third wasn't but also wasn't a school I would send my own children to.
We get people from the state sector come thinking independent is an easy ride with long holidays. They don't last half a term. We just have different challenges to state.
No, I'm not paid more than in state. Slightly higher salary, but worse pension and benefits so overall about the same.
Behaviour (from the kids, not necessarily the parents!) is much better.

I work in mainstream. Hour lunch. We can sit with the kids in exchange for lunch costing £1. The kids love the interaction but I wouldn't say any of us are in the canteen longer than 15-20 minutes

This is how it works at DS's school.

My lunch break is an hour ten minutes. So plenty of time to sit down properly and eat lunch, 3 courses plus salad offered. Then head up to staff room for a cuppa!

There are multiply teacher tables so not sitting at the same table as the students, but you do interact with them in the queue (teachers join inside and queue up, only skip of meetings etc…), collecting food, and moving around the hall. So modelling manners, food choices and also more eyes in more places. Works well. I like it.

I don’t often stay for tea and there are a lot less teachers then so sometime you eat on your own or occasionally that year 10 boy who has been a completed pain all year comes and joins you as he thinks you could do with some company! Students can constantly surprise you!

We don’t have working directed time in the same way as state, and can be asked to do duties over lunch (tea and breakfast in a boarding school). It isn’t compulsory to eat with the kids. You can grab a sandwich and go somewhere else if you wish.

Not private school, but primary age DC and I went to Italy for a school trip where they went to an Italian primary and the teachers there eat with their class. One meal that everyone gets. They also stay with their class through their entire primary (obviously not if they leave..) so the pupils and teachers know each other really well. We went out for some trips and meals with the teachers in the evenings too. They were all really lovely and so nurturing with their pupils.

I thought it was a lovely idea but I guess that maybe teaching was a bit less stressful than it might be here.

Lunch is 90 minutes - because they also have lunch clubs. Different year groups come in at different times. The staff eat in the same canteen. Its self service. Each table has a teacher table mat, indicating the teachers will sit in clusters of 4 (ie teachers sit 2 side by side with 2 opposite) the children sit randomly with them on large tables. My child used to love sitting near by the teachers at lunch time - because she could hear them 'gossip' and learn their first names. Also on one occasion a girl was silently choking and the close proximity of a teacher saved the day.

We don't have a single specialist teacher in my state school 😂 I teach it all, except when I'm on PPA when an HLTA covers.

@TigerMummy1
My contract agrees that I waive working time limits. I always wondered how these looong teachers's days (and weeks) worked. That explains so much! Wow.
My DCs loved having lunch with their teachers, it's such a lovely and important thing to share a meal and interact socially with children, rather than let them be fed at the other end of the room like puppies.
Very grateful to all the teachers for all their care and hard work. We see you!

I went to one of the top state schools in the country. A teacher was assigned to sit at the end of every table and often spoke to them. I think it's good