Mealtime "rules" and family studies/morning baskets

Do any of you practice the old fashioned “children don’t speak unless spoken to?” We don’t… But I sure see the wisdom in it now!  And if I were starting over, I would make a real effort to train my children this way.  It’s one thing to have one or two children who want to talk about whatever they think of (usually silliness), but it’s a whole different animal to have 4 or more and a toddler still being trained to stay at the table and eat nicely (none of my other kids were a problem to this extent in this way). We can easily get 2 or 3 conversations going at the same time and Mom wants to be heard more because she has more of value to speak of! Those of you who have several children in a wide age range and do family studies around mealtime… How does this play out in your home?  I’m (still… Again) wanting to get this to work, but l have some kiddos who make it quite a challenge. Has anyone accomplished making order out of some pretty well established chaos in this area?  How did you do it?