Xavier’s First Chipotle
Carole and I took Xavier out to Chipotle tonight for dinner – his first trip. Given his father’s love of the restaurant, its actually somewhat surprising that we haven’t gotten him there before. He had rice and carnitas, feeding himself from the lid of Carole’s bol. Of course, being 11 months old (today!) a lot more rice ended up on the floor than in him – but that’s to be expected I guess.
Which actually brings me to a question for the other parents out there. At what age did you let your child feed himself/herself?
Apparently Carole’s sister didn’t let her kids feed themselves until about they could maneuver a spoon and fork consistently – i.e. when they’re around 2 years old. Xavier has only a vague idea that things like spoons exist yet, at least as implements of food delivery. To Carole and I, the way he’ll get better at feeding himself is through lots of practice. He’s certainly interested in feeding himself – he’ll only rarely let us spoon food into him, more frequently trying to grab the spoon himself or at least bat it away (ever the defender 😉 ).
So – what say you all? When should children start feeding themselves?
As soon as they can pick up food and put it into their mouths with a rate of success of at least 50%. Duncan figured out how to use a spoon and fork via our encouragement and simple mimicking us, and he’s been eating by himself for… god, I want to say around a year or so now. He doesn’t always use his fork and spoon, but he always tries.
As I remember, we sort of started letting him feed himself the easy stuff while we fed him as well for the harder stuff. And now the kid eats a carton of yogurt by himself with a spoon, no problem. And he’s not quite two yet.