S p o o n P o s i t i o n
Some developmental milestones for 2-year-olds come more naturally than others. For example, the “resist sharing my toys with other children” milestone should come without any parental intervention.* The “love to use the word ‘no’” milestone should come easily to any child with even the most basic communication skills, at least that’s what I assume being the parent of a child who still refuses to talk. Abbie never says “no;” she can shake her head from side-to-side, but she doesn’t seem to do so to say “no.” She does however have a lovely gesture where she’ll stick her index finger in her mouth when I tell her to do something she doesn’t want to do. That sign could mean “no,” or possibly “@#$% you.”
Then there are the milestones we have to work with Abbie to achieve. We’ve been working hard on the “begin using utensils to feed myself” milestone at meals recently. Ever since we started feeding her solids, I’ve preferred to operate the utensils myself, even after she acquired the ability to move an implement into her mouth. Meals move faster when I wield the spoon, partly because I shovel food into her mouth faster than she can, and partly because I have to clean a lot more food that she accidentally and not-so- accidentally when she uses the spoon. The one exception is I will spear fruit or some other fairly solid object on a fork, and hold it vertically for her to grab. I’ve been doing this for several months, ever since I realized that doing so would allow me to keep my eyes on the newspaper while feeding her breakfast. She refused to grab a utensil from any non-vertical position, so I continued doing this assuming that she’d get enough utensil practice.
A couple weeks ago Ellie informed me that her utensil progress had stagnated for months, and it was time to step up to spoons. We began working with her lunch yogurt, loading the spoon and leaving it in the container for her to grab. The biggest problem she had here was keeping the food facing up. She wanted to grab the spoon and vertically rotate it into her mouth so that her tongue met the food instead of the spoon’s bottom. At least her tongue would have met the food if any remained on the spoon after the journey instead of on her pants. Ellie corrected her of this problem quickly, teaching her to properly swivel the spoon into her mouth before reaching the fruit on the bottom.
That’s where we’re working now. If I’m in a hurry I’ll brandish the spoon, otherwise I let her feed herself as long as we’re eating something vaguely sticky like macaroni & cheese, or meatloaf. Things like spaghetti are a little advanced for her as they tend to slide off the spoon and onto her pants, which forces me to try to clean set-in stains. Sometimes during laundry I stick my index finger in my mouth to let the stains know what I think of them.
By the way, when offering Abbie the spoon, I hold it in the center of her body and perfectly perpendicular so I don’t favor either side. She grabs the spoon with her left hand about 90% of the time. I’m sorry left-handedness is genetic, sweetie.
* The “likes sharing my toys with others” milestone doesn’t show up on my chart, but I’m sure Ellie is hoping that it comes sometime before age 30 so that I’ll quit throwing a fit every time she uses my computer.
Then there are the milestones we have to work with Abbie to achieve. We’ve been working hard on the “begin using utensils to feed myself” milestone at meals recently. Ever since we started feeding her solids, I’ve preferred to operate the utensils myself, even after she acquired the ability to move an implement into her mouth. Meals move faster when I wield the spoon, partly because I shovel food into her mouth faster than she can, and partly because I have to clean a lot more food that she accidentally and not-so- accidentally when she uses the spoon. The one exception is I will spear fruit or some other fairly solid object on a fork, and hold it vertically for her to grab. I’ve been doing this for several months, ever since I realized that doing so would allow me to keep my eyes on the newspaper while feeding her breakfast. She refused to grab a utensil from any non-vertical position, so I continued doing this assuming that she’d get enough utensil practice.
A couple weeks ago Ellie informed me that her utensil progress had stagnated for months, and it was time to step up to spoons. We began working with her lunch yogurt, loading the spoon and leaving it in the container for her to grab. The biggest problem she had here was keeping the food facing up. She wanted to grab the spoon and vertically rotate it into her mouth so that her tongue met the food instead of the spoon’s bottom. At least her tongue would have met the food if any remained on the spoon after the journey instead of on her pants. Ellie corrected her of this problem quickly, teaching her to properly swivel the spoon into her mouth before reaching the fruit on the bottom.
That’s where we’re working now. If I’m in a hurry I’ll brandish the spoon, otherwise I let her feed herself as long as we’re eating something vaguely sticky like macaroni & cheese, or meatloaf. Things like spaghetti are a little advanced for her as they tend to slide off the spoon and onto her pants, which forces me to try to clean set-in stains. Sometimes during laundry I stick my index finger in my mouth to let the stains know what I think of them.
By the way, when offering Abbie the spoon, I hold it in the center of her body and perfectly perpendicular so I don’t favor either side. She grabs the spoon with her left hand about 90% of the time. I’m sorry left-handedness is genetic, sweetie.
* The “likes sharing my toys with others” milestone doesn’t show up on my chart, but I’m sure Ellie is hoping that it comes sometime before age 30 so that I’ll quit throwing a fit every time she uses my computer.
posted by Matt at
10:33 PM
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