Would you complain about this?

[muffinflop]

DS (year one) is constantly coming home from school with a sticker from his dinner lady for finishing his lunch first . the result of which is that he now literally shovels food into his mouth when eating. I've told him to slow down, which he will for a while before shovelling commences again.

It's driving me mad but I don't know if it's something worth mentioning at school or something I should deal with at home?

Leaving aside the usual should you/shouldn't you stickers-as-rewards rant, I have to say that seems a very silly reason for giving a sticker.

I would have a quiet word with the teacher about it and ask her to pass it onto the dinner lady. Stop the madness!

I wouldn't complain... But I would tell the school theeffect it is having

I would have a word with teacher.
Not sure why you would give out a sticker for something like this?????

Very odd and and it's not at all helpful. Shovelling food down is no way to enjoy it. What a strange thing to reward.

Bizarre reason to reward a child.

Yes I would.

Not sure it's a complaint, but speed of eating seems to be a bit of an obsession with dinner ladies. My DTDs are in Reception, are tiny and have always taken ages to eat meals. Since they started school, they often come home with less than half of their food eaten because the dinner ladies tell them that time is up. I'm fairly sure that this is because they want to scoot the kids outside so that they can tidy up. Frankly, I think the children eating a sensible amount of food is more important than scooting them outside to play - particularly given the fact that they are in Yr R and therefore get a lot of outside play during the day.

Eating up quickly is not something I think they should be encouraging or rewarding. Nice manners, on the other hand, would be worth a sticker.

Are you sure it's for the speed he is eating and not the amount he has eaten? DS1 sometimes gets a sticker for trying something new but not for shovelling it down the fastest!

Do you think its because some children get very easily distracted and thus are very slow at eating and perhaps needs some encouragement to sit down and eat a meal at a reasonable speed. Obviously this isnt the case for your DS and I don't think that they should be rewarding children for finishing first, just trying to see where their logic may be coming from.

its probably because there isn't room for the whole school to sit down at once so lunchtimes are staggered-the midday supervisors have to hurry along the little ones so that the older children have space to sit down when they come in.

Oh I would come and back you up on this, my ds1 has developed disgusting eating habits - every mealtime is a race DESPITE dh and I moaning, nagging, bribing, explaining etc etc that good manners are important to us. And dd1 generally comes home with half her packed lunch because she "didn't get time" to eat it.

I know dd1 probably is a chatter and ds1 just wants to get out to play but surely there is a balance.

Maybe the dinner lady is sponsored by Gaviscon....