How to teach baby how to use a spoon

My boy is almost 12months now, but I struggle with teaching him how to use a spoon. I see other younger babies who are able use spoons cleanly.
Whenever I give him a spoon, he just plays with it and not actually eat anything, making a big mess. When I try to guide him on how to use it, he gets upset thinking that I’m trying to take away his toy. He doesn’t let me touch his hands at all. 😩
I end up spoon feeding him yoghurt and mushy things myself or give him finger foods.
How do you teach a baby how to use a spoon?!

note: I’m using NumNum baby’s first spoons, tried using multiple spoons at a time to swap out but he just grabs all the spoons and not let go.

Read more on Peanut

The views expressed in community are solely the opinions of participants, and do not reflect those of Peanut.

Learn more about our guidelines.

Add a comment

My son is the same way. What I'm doing is I'm letting him hold spoon and I'll hold the end of it to guide him that way. I did the same with daughter and it worked for her

eat similar food at the same time as he does (like a yoghurt with one of those spoons) so he can mimic / copy what you do. he might pick it up better this way, especially if he's a visual learner

I'm having the same struggle with my 13mo. He also just wants to shove his hands into whatever he's eating.... even if it's a liquid.

Following for tips because SAME

My son is 17 months and just started using a spoon. I introduced it early when he started eating solids but he just wanted to play with it as well, so I let him. Even when it wasn't meal time I'd give him spoons to play with and he loved it. All on his own one day when i was feeding him oatmeal he wanted the spoon and started feeding himself. Hardly made a mess even. Your baby watches you more than you think and they are taking everything in, just be patient and don't force it

Trying to use a spoon is an 18 month milestone, and eating skillfully with a spoon is a 2 year milestone, just keep offering consistently. We do mostly finger foods with a few spoonfuls of yogurt or cottage cheese for practice at most meals, and have been consistently since six months and my son still doesn't have it down, it's just too early.

My LO is 18 months and can use a spoon and fork. We first introduced a spoon at 6 months, but he really struggled with the curved handle silicone rubber ones. He was finding it difficult to scoop properly and food was constantly falling off. Plus all the curved handles cater for right handed kids and he has left hand dominance ( since 13 months). However the moment I introduced a hard straight handle plastic spoon from ikea around 15 months, it was a game changer. Maybe you could try a different style of spoon as see if that helps?

in our community

Nursery funding

My child turned 9 months last week. I applied for government funded hours nearly 2 months ago and so well within the required timeframe for the April term, however upon receiving my first invoice without the funding applied and having questioned this, I have now been informed that the stretched funding doesn’t start until 4th May.

Has anyone else been told it won’t start until May?

The government site states it should start from April 1st, and so I intentionally set my nursery start and return to work as the start of April for that reason, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to afford the nursery on my sole income without the funding

NHS job

Anyone work for the NHS and does 12 hour shifts? How do you work around childcare and your partners job?

He has no respect for anything to do with me.

Husband and I decided to separate 3 days ago. I've been sleeping on the floor in the kids room, and we both have to stay in the same apartment for a while. He wont stop pushing little things and I am reaching my limit. Photos in comments

Toddlers

How often are your toddlers asking for food? My oldest who is 3 just finished a whole plate of food and not even 10 minutes later he’s requesting more food. I know he’s going through a growth spurt, but how do you respond to this.

Is this normal?

Is it just my husband that does this? He is able to work from home via his computer and in the mornings and evenings he is on there doing his job. When he is done for the day he tends to stay in the room and either play video games or watch something. He will occasionally come out and play with the girls for a few minutes and that’s it but when I really need him he says he is busy. My daughters are both 1 year old now and I am just wondering how much involvement should he have with them now?
Idk if this is the norm or not…..

Identity crisis?

Am I the only sahm who feels like they have lost their identity??? I don’t make money for my family, when I used to make great money. But I refuse to drop my under a year old baby off with strangers.
My husband works so much. But I have no control over bringing in money and I’m a control freak type of person! I feel l like I’m losing my grip because we are kind of broke, but day care would only eat up my income anyways! So what’s the point. I’m a workaholic and now I’m just a twitching bum.
I wish I could work from home but so far that’s a fake dream. I’m almost 9 months pp, and I just need to know these awful mood swings and depression will end soon! Send wine!