Why does my kid come home from school with a full lunch?
Children often get too distracted during the school day to finish their packed lunches, eating only their snacks and leaving the rest untouched. This leaves them coming home absolutely starving and forces parents to constantly figure out how to get them to actually eat at school.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1Schools implementing assigned seats for lunch to minimize distractions
- 2Packing foods that are quick to eat
- 3Pack a healthy lunch and let the child be hungry if they choose not to eat.
- 4Pack less snacks so the child does not fill up on snacks instead of lunch.
- 5Shift focus to providing a big breakfast and a large dinner after school.
- 6Use a bento box with small compartments for snack-like healthy foods.
- 7Get the child involved in making their own lunch or picking out food at the grocery store.
In their words
Unedited, most upvoted first, each linked to the thread it came from.
“My 6 year old has been coming home with a full lunch box. He eats most of his snacks but won't touch his lunch.”source ↗
Beginning_Regular170 · r/Parenting · 37 upvotes
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 6Why do schools have silent lunch rules?
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- 3Teenager constantly eating all the food in the house
- 4Preschooler refusing to follow rules and leaving the classroom
- 3When should you serve food at an afternoon kids birthday party?