to think that children pestering adults for food is bad manners?

[vladthedisorganised]

Have posted about this on another thread but it is annoying me a bit.
DD and I walk home from school past a local park. It's a reasonable walk (we don't have a car) so when I go to collect her from school, I usually bring her something to eat on the way back.

There's a fair amount of children that come up to other parents asking for a snack, as well as their own. This gets awkward when we then see them again in the local park - many have been driven there while we've walked - and I'll be ambushed again by more children as we go past. The parents appear to bring something for their own children to eat, but this doesn't seem sufficient - particularly when other DCs are mooching the food in question.

What gets me is that I'm very firm with DD that she shouldn't be bugging other parents for food; but it is getting hard when she can see that no other parent seems to object to their DCs doing this. (Swapping is OK, though I'm considering curtailing this too) Other parents might possibly insist that their DC says thank you for the unreciprocated snack, but most tell their DCs to 'see if minivlad will share'.

AIBU to think that it's bad manners to pester for food? If I gave every child a snack that asked for one (or two or three or four) then I'd spend a bloody fortune - playdates are already really expensive with DCs demanding snacks all the time during the walk home!

Little children are attracted to other families food.
There has been some really nasty language (on this post) in relation to those who pester.
I am sure we are taking about really little children here, aren't we?

ici
You are lucky your children finished their lunches.
Some children don't.
They are hungry.

We had a proper old fashioned picnic on the green last summer Feminine. We'd only moved to the village a couple of weeks beforehand and were told about it the day before. I rustled up some quick and easy stuff for the three of us and was totally put to shame by the banquets the neighbours bought out .

Oh it was wonderful - Victoria Sponges, Trifles, trays of cucumber sandwiches, salmon platters and Game Pies. I can't wait until this years

ex that sounds lovely. really nice.
Could you manage that every day though?
Cos, during heatwave recently.... That is what the organised mums were busy with!

I don't think there is anything wrong with a small snack if it is a long walk home, or there is a park visit beforehand. Especially if then you don't eat till later and they had lunch at school at 12. But I am very arbitrary when it comes to snacks because I am just not organised. After this thread I will be having a sterner talk to my DD about asking for food from other people though!

What gets me about our school is that the ice-cream van is outside every day and has been since about the end of Feb :-0 So every day my two ask for an ice-cream and every day I say no. It is wearing me down.
But I see people that buy their kids an ice-cream every day. Every single day. That's just crazy.

DS has a classmate who is terrible for this! We used to walk home together and every day she'd make a beeline for me rather than her own mum on the offchance that I'd have something to eat in my bag, and if I didn't she'd go through DS's lunchbox and eat anything he'd left. Her mum never stopped her and I ended up taking two of everything every day because I felt so bad if I had to say no! Cost me a fortune and I was quite relieved when DS decided he wanted to start scooting home with a different friend, which gave me an excuse to go a different way. She's the same if she comes round to play - she will literally stand at the front door when she arrives and her first words will be 'Can I have some sweets?' and has been known to go through my cupboards and even the freezer looking for sweets/lollies. And it's certainly not the case that her parents don't feed her!

Maybe it's the fear about DC's weight that means their lunches do not have sufficient complex carbs? FGS at 3.15 it's only 3hrs since lunch, unless a child has a medical need they can wait until they get home for their "snack".

I find it really weird to learn of people arriving at school with bags of brioche, bananas, & sandwiches. It reminds me of the Jamie Oliver programmes about school dinners, when mums were filmed plying their DC with food through the school fence.

Just because children are demanding snacks immediately they come out of school, it doesn't mean they need them. I BF on demand, but by the time children are 4 or 5 they should be eating for the sustenance when they need it, not because they fancy a treat.

My DS was too busy chatting and playing to need a snack before he got home. To me it seems like a old-fashioned way of parenting, my mum's (parents in 1960s/70s) generation used to see their main role as a providing their offspring with food and clean clothes. This providing treats/snacks on demand is a distortion of the mother/child relationship surely - co-dependence IMO.

silver
If you can't get a snack from your parents, then who can you rely on?
I don't really understand your point of view?

Due to poor time management at school, my older DC often don't get time to eat all their lunch, and will often eat the rest on the way home, they've still always eaten all their dinner, so I am fine with this.
I will also bring snacks for the toddler to munch on while they eat, or she mugs her big brothers for theirs and they can never seem to say no to her

The problem we ended up with, was one of the girls we used to walk home with, used to ask for food, and when corrected by her mum that she wasn't to ask, she just used to hover right next of them, making remarks such as 'I'm so hungry' etc. Until my too generous boys would give her a biscuit, or the last half of their crisps.
The girl is a very fussy eater, no reason for it other than people having pandered to it all her life, and is on school dinners, which she never eats 'because she didn't like it' (I can't work out why her mum doesn't put her on packed lunches tbh, probably because she gets free school meals)

I had enough one day, and told her that in no uncertain terms would my boys be sharing any more and if she'd eaten her dinner at school, she wouldn't be hungry.
Cue cats bum mouth from her mum.
Then a few weeks later we had 'oh well, I wouldn't let my children eat on the way home' even though her toddler does... And then even worse came things like 'Oh, did they not learn how to share!'
I pointedly told her that yes, they DO know how to share they had been feeding her DD on the way home for months until I stopped it.

Funny enough I don't talk to this particular mum any more for oh so many reasons, this and her putting down my toddler behind my back were the main two!

My boys have never asked for food other than when they were toddlers, and we taught them not to. My DD is 3 and already knows she can only ask me for something to eat, (or daddy obviously and grandparents)
It drives me mad. I had to put a picnic at the park away last year because of two children just coming and helping themselves! So rude!

Saucy
I didn't do it-noone did. This was a few years ago

I'm not tight and my DC aren't called Tarquinus either

DH often worked shifts-I wouldn't keep a 4/5 year old up late just because their father would be "gutted".
Once they were older we ate together.

"you can eat when you get home, it was always more exciting to be running home with your friends and your mum and siblings for company, or walking home chatting to your mum, than snacking"

lol

It takes a small child about 30 seconds to woof down a slice of bread folded in half with a bit of cheese in. Then they run off and climb the tree and do all the stuff.

I am a bit confused that anyone would think a bite to eat would prevent a child from doing any or all of the things listed on a 30 minute walk

Some people must spend a lot of their time feeling really quite angry, I think. If the sight of a 4yo in school uniform walking through a field while eating a stick of cheese is enough to induce "country's going to the dogs" type emotional responses!

Oh I got a snack after school as well - 70s/80s. It was a club biscuit IIRC.

ALSO when we were older we used to go to the sweet shop on the way home and buy wham bars and those blue ice pops and all sorts of old shit This was back in the days when everyone was thin as a herring, as well.

But don't you see why the other DC kept pestering?

Food has a number of social conventions around it. If you are eating when the person with you isn't, it is the norm to offer some of yours, even very young children become away of this. If your child has this "essential " snack and the other does not, it is polite to offer to share.

I suspect this is the reason, why (until very recently?) children would have their snack when they got home. I still think it is downright rude to not offer children on a play date or walking with your children the same as you would your own.

It all sounds very awkward about what is acceptable. I guess some children are now becoming popular with their peers based on the treats on offer from the parents. This is madness IMO, and it sounds like some mums are colluding in this behaviour.

If I choose to feed my child a snack on the way home I will,
I have no problem with my children sharing said snack, however if you are using me, or allowing your child to use me so your child can have a snack I have a problem.
It was expected that everyday my sons would share, she never provided a snack for her DD, much less reciprocated our generosity, even though her DD was always soooo hungry.
It is not my responsibility to feed someone elses child.

A playdate is completely different and of course that child would have a snack provided if I did one for my own

I don't even bring a snack to school, it's their left over lunch for christs sake.

It takes a small child about 30 seconds to woof down a slice of bread folded in half with a bit of cheese in. Then they run off and climb the tree and do all the stuff.

sounds suspiciously like a sandwich ,
three of my dc, walking home from school, I have to walk up to school in the first place, you suggest I yet again make sandwiches just so they can walk home - dont think this was ever part of the school run.

I also get the 'Oh why don't you see if MiniElmers will share'
It makes you feel like you can't say no, or it feels if you say no the DCs aren't learning to share! grr!

Erm obviously if you are picking a child up you don't take enough food to feed the others X hundred children at the school!

You see most people manage to navigate the apparently terribly complicated social norms you talk about, without too much trouble.

I am out walking. I am drinking a bottle of water. I meet you. Do I offer you a swig? No of course I don't. I arrange to meet you for coffee. Do I offer to buy you a coffee? Yed, or maybe it is your "turn" to buy me one.

This stuff is not rocket science, you are really over-thinking it.

Most posters have said that what the OP talks about sounds very unusual and is not what happens where they are.

i am not assuming chocolate bars, I am remembering chocolate bars. some other parents would provide chocolate bars, none of this healthy snack nonsense

think the original question from OP was not whether or not to provide snacks, in any way, but whether other children should pester
I am sure we all agree,
the other children should not pester

chocolatelife of course you must do with your own DC what you want.

Are you seriously having a go at me for giving my child a snack in the field on the way home?

Why? What on earth is it to you? If my child is hungry after school and I think a snack will make the 30 min walk home easier then I will give it one. You are telling me I am WRONG to do that, as it means that you HAVE to do the same for your DC?

What on earth are you on about?

I never realised this was all such a bone of contention. And that people get angry when they see other people feeding their children

So, what happens if I bring a snickers bar to school for my DC, my DC then shares with another DC who has asked, my DC shares, other DC has allergic reaction?
This is one very good reason parents shouldn't allow their DC to ask for food.
I might think to ask child if he has any allergies, my DC probably wouldn't though... Very young DC probably don't think much about their own allergies as parents deal with it while they are young...

Not that I bring snickers for my DC, they are MINE
Shock horror I do occasionally bring them a sprinkled doughnut each...

touch paranoid whirlpool?
i am not angry nor do i care whether you provide snacks.
i am just remembering that i didnt provide snacks for the walk home
although i feel guilty now slightly

Thing is I had anxiety when my children were young and the reason I am posting is that I would have read this (as I read threads like it) and it would have affected my behaviour. I would have been very upset that I had apparently unwittingly been angering other parents at the school and I would have stopped providing a snack for my 4yo, I would also have felt uncomfortable BF the other one as it's food after all and you know I was quite ill.

I just think that sometimes, well, people read stuff and take all sorts away. And I don't think the people who say you must not do this it is awful about something which is, in the scheme of things, utterly inconsequential, think to consider whether it is really necessary to be so intractable. Or maybe they do? I don't know.

Anyway that's why I have been posting saying You Know What it's FINE to give your child a snack, really, it's not the end of the world.