Island County 4-H
Conversation
A study has shown that the one thing all Rhodes Scholars have in common is that during their childhood they regularly sat down for dinner with their families. Doing this is more fun if you have interesting things to talk about. To help you practice lively conversation at your family dinner table - here are some ideas to get you started.
Conversation Cafe Model
If you and your family already engage in lively conversations at the dinner table, you're doing fine on your own!
If you'd like a little help from a pretty straightforward conversation exercise, check this one out:
http://conversationcafe.org/Cafe%20Basics.htm
Some conversation starters for June:
- What garden vegetables like cooler weather?
- If you could only eat what you had growing in your garden right now, how full would your plate be?
- Watch the national weather tonight on television. Look at the temperatures and see if you can guess what might be growing well in various parts of the country.
Some conversation starters for April:
- What goes into making a pepperoni pizza? Can you name all the ingredients and where they come from? Can you figure out how many different kinds of plants are involved? If there is meat involved, what animal(s) provided that, and what plants do they eat?
- Here on Whidbey, we have access to a lot of fresh, tasty shellfish, like mussels and clams. It might be easy to consider them a "free-standing food," but what do they need in order to be healthy and nutritious for us?
- If you could only eat things that grow wild here on Whidbey at this time of year, what would you be eating?
- How much food did your family end up throwing out this past week? What kinds of resources and activities went into getting those items to your table in the first place?
To let us know what your family came up with in response to these questions. The first family to answer a question a week for eight weeks will get a prize! Send your food for thought by
This page updated: 5 June 2008