The lunch period is between 12:40 – 1:40 p.m. Teachers and paid lunch assistants supervise during the lunch hour. Outdoor lunch recess is from 1:00 – 1:40 p.m. All students are expected to go outside unless they are involved in a special activity or have a doctor’s note.

Students are expected to follow the guidelines below during their lunch period:

• remain seated at their desks at all times
• speak using an indoor voice
• ask permission if it is necessary to leave the room
• push in chairs and clean up the area where they have eaten
• wait until the teacher or school assistant dismisses them
• return all garbage to lunch box as they leave, recycle and put in compost bin items as appropriate
• speak respectfully to the school assistant, teacher and  peers

In its general policy # 335.0: Lunch Period Responsibilities, the York Region District School Board discourages going home for lunch for those students:

• who reside more than one kilometre from the school;
• who are bussed to school;
• who have any medical condition that makes walking home and back at noon inadvisable; and
• where the distance is less than one kilometer but where in the considered opinion of the principal, the students should stay at school for reasons of safety.

The option of students going off school property at lunch hour is fraught with both existing and potential problems. The schools’ responsibility is quite clear in this regard. Lunch hour supervision, responsibility, and activities are provided for students who remain at school, or, for those who walk home for lunch, immediately upon their return from lunch.

Students who leave the property at lunch hour are offering themselves up to opportunities for all sorts of unnecessary difficulties and choices - choices which are often too difficult for them to make well. In order to ensure your child’s success and safety at school, we ask students in grades 1-3 to remain on school property during the lunch hour. Those students in grades 4 and 5 wishing to leave the school building for lunch must do so, only with parental supervision.

Students leaving the building under the supervision of their parents are still expected to sign out at the beginning of the lunch hour and to sign back in at the office upon their return, irrespective of the time. Nothing overrides the Principals’ responsibility for the supervision of students during the school day in accordance with the Education Act.