Some children stay for a snack,some for tea

[Mia73]

Hiya, just wondered if anybody has children after school and some of them stay shorter time and just have a light snack and others stay longer for tea. How do you arrange it? As at the moment I only have children who stay for light snack but in September I will have both so just wondered if anybody would share with me how you do it please...Do others or all of them have a light snack first etc...

[shortstuff]

Hiya, just wondered if anybody has children after school and some of them stay shorter time and just have a light snack and others stay longer for tea. How do you arrange it? As at the moment I only have children who stay for light snack but in September I will have both so just wondered if anybody would share with me how you do it please...Do others or all of them have a light snack first etc...

mine all stay long enough to eat a meal, sorry

[Tazmin68]

All mine have dinner too.

[supermumy]

Mine all have dinner by 5

[VeggieSausage]

I have a combo of staying for tea and going before tea. I do a snack when we get in, those not staying for tea that are older get a larger snack than those having tea here at 5pm. They all accept it and if anyone moans I simply say that X will not get their tea until late so they have more. Works out fine - the main thing is to have a system and stick with it, I used to feel guilty that the ones who weren't here for tea moaned that it wasn't fair but they soon stopped when I stuck to my guns and its fine...

[Becci26]

Mine all get a snack regardless if they are staying for tea or not,

If not and they are particularly hungry then I give them a larger snack but the ones staying for tea will always get a light snack as we have tea at 5

[samb]

I do snack as soon as we get home from school - usually 2 different fruits cut up and either rice cakes, breadstick, biscuit etc. Then some leave between 4:30-5. I have dinner ready so that at 5 I have those staying for dinner up the table eating at 5 ready to leave 5:30-6. It would be too long for those having dinner at 5 to not have a snack as lunch is at 12 at school - I think 5 hours is a long time to wait for food. The snacks are only light so I wouldn't stop a child having a snack. If they didn't eat much dinner I might give them less snack the next day.

[bindy]

I do the same as samb. All have snack straight from school. The early ones leave at 5pm. The others have tea and leave at 545-6pm.

[loocyloo]

i used to do a snack as soon as we got home for everyone ( usually 3.45 ), but i found everyone was really hungry and then those having tea, didn't eat much tea ( tea was at 4.45 ) plus, we seemed to be spending most of our time at the table!

so, i changed it, and brought tea forward to 4.30, which made tea less of a rush and those having tea had tea, and those having snack, had snack! sometimes snack was a 'taster' of tea ( a little bit of curry, rice & naan for example ) or maybe whatever was for pudding ( yogurt with fruit ) or sometimes toast or whatever i thought of!

we moved and i decided to keep tea at 4.30 ( esp as we finish school later here ) and generally everyone has tea. occaisonally a couple of schoolies have snack, but the system works well.

mindees start going home fom about 5.10, so we usually have finished tea, or at least main courses!

[Mia73]

Great ideas, thanks everybody!

[busybee_mummy]

Mine all stay for dinner, so we serve up at 4:15 (or there about), but if I had some that would have dinner at home, then I would give a light snack at the same time.
My own children have swimming lessons on Thurs so they just have some toast and fruit before they go and then a late dinner when they get back.
I like to have dinner finished and cleared away for parents starting to come at 5. Other wise it can get a bit hectic!