Otherwise, they can feel like boarders and not family. In addition to the distractions of television and newspapers, the telephone can interrupt conversation or take a family member away for the whole meal. The value of the family meal can be demonstrated either by turning on the answering machine or politely telling callers that dinnertime is not a good time to talk. Some families are very intentional about what they discuss at family meals. In one family all the memebers say something about what happened to them during the day.
Some parents deliberately bring up issues of importance in the wider world.
As mentioned before, some parents deliberately avoid disciplinary conversations with children at meals, unless the child is misbehaving during the meal itself. Similarly, it is best to postpone marital conflicts until later. If so, you strategize to change the balance. One stepfather found himself consistently shut out of dinner conversations because one of his stepdaughters wouldn't talk to him. Then his wife helped him get more conversation air time by addressing him directly more often, rather than just having a free-form family discussion that too often left him out.