Lunch at any school is a time of socialization with friends as much as a time for having a midday meal. While that is something accurate for any school, here at Oakdale Academy we seek to use the lunch meal as another opportunity to develop our community and pour into the lives of our students.
Our lunches are planned where students from multiple grade levels in our Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric Schools sit together along with a faculty or staff member, with students rotating tables monthly.
Logistically, this presents certain challenges to ensure students are moving about the tables, sitting at the correct table, and learning how to interact with each other.
Among our goals for this special and unique time are:
· Uplifting and God-honoring conversations monitored by teachers as well as student leaders from our House system.
· Showing students that they are part of a larger community at Oakdale Academy.
· Modeling lives of virtue and manners while enjoying each other’s company.
· Assisting each other in fulfilling our Mission.
Teachers, staff, and House leaders have a series of “conversation starters” they use to ensure the talk around the cafeteria table is good and within the bounds of our mutual understanding of propriety.
For all of us at Oakdale Academy, lunch is not a break from what we do where “anything goes”, but rather a time for students, teachers, and staff to relax in a setting that still maintains the wonderful aspects of our culture.
Finally, we see in the life of the Christian Church the importance placed on meals. Throughout our history, even during Jesus’ earthly ministry, the sharing of a meal with others was an important time for refreshment as much as for teaching, training, prayer, and building up our lives to point toward Him.
The Table
In many ways, we hope the lunch table reflects the family dining table where we hear about each other’s day, challenges, and praises, and are able and invited to encourage each other while building new friendships and mentoring relationships.
Sitting around a table, we seek to replicate the uplifting conversations, the discipleship, and the celebration of this important ritual.
Throughout our history and the works of Scripture, we see the importance placed on eating around a table together – in good times as well as bad.
Moses and the Chosen People ate quickly during the final plague prior to their escape from Egypt. Before they left, though, the meal they shared invoked their sense of heritage and history, as exemplified in the significance of the Passover celebrations of today.
King David, in the Psalms, reminds us of the importance of the table, even one that is laid “in the presence of my enemies” (Psalm 23).
The table is key to understanding that we must nourish ourselves not only on the meal placed in front of us but on the conversations filled with encouraging, empathy, and love – all pointing to a shared experience that honors God.
Testimonial
From philosophy to reality, our parents greatly appreciate the format of our lunches. Many have said over the years that it was ‘one of the selling points’ to Oakdale Academy.
Specifically, one family shared the following:
"One of the things we appreciate most about Oakdale is that the children of all ages & grades interact together often. I will never forget our first year when I was walking my then Kindergartner into school for Opening Ceremony and a senior boy, who was walking past us in the opposite direction, looked over directly at my son and called him out by his name with a big "Hello!" It lit up my son's world and my heart. It's a beautiful sight to witness the older kids boosting the younger ones and in turn, teaching them to continue to do the same as they get older."
Final Thought
Whether in the classroom, the hallway, or, yes, even the lunch table, our focus is ensuring our students have opportunity to order their affections and loves. In so doing, we point them to our Savior, creating in them habits that will allow them to follow and to serve Him more fully in their lives.
It is wonderful to think – and witness – all that can happen for our Lord in just a few minutes while eating lunch.