11 month old throwing food.....whats the best response?

[cheesenpickle]

Hi

DS is blw and up to now has eaten everything put in front of him. He has now started to chuck food on the floor. We only put a few pieces of food on his tray (otherwise it all goes in his mouth at once) but there seem to be two reasons he throws food 1) he chucks items hes not so keen on and leaves food he really likes - he knows there is more of this to come so wants to eat that first and will sometimes then eat the not so keen item, but not always 2)if hes not really very hungry.

Do I ignore, do i say no? Should I put it back once and if it goes again just end the meal. What in your experience works. (Nursery have offered him other food which I think im going to ask them not to do) What do you think?

Take the food away, get him down and tell him NO - -repeat ad nausium until he gets the message. This has worked with all mine.

If its at the start of a meal ie; hes not eaten much of it, do I not offer food till next meal time?

I think he's a bit young not to offer food till the next meal as he won't fully understand the consequences of throwing food like a 3 year-old who's doing it out of defiance. You don't want him waking in the night hungry. I agree with McPhee - a few stern no's, withhold the food by placing it out of his reach but so he can still see it and wait till he's crying out for it before resuming. We had a short stage of weird food tantrums around that age but then it stopped (for the time being!)

In a minute there will be a queue of people telling you to humour him because it's normal, not to bother till he's older. I'd put a stop to it myself. It'll beeasier now than when he's bigger. Tell him "No" very firmly. Maybe just hand him one piece at a time. If you have to, take all the food away and tell him why. Give him some more a minute or so later and see what happens. Take it away again if he throws it again, that's what I dd anyway. You might have to be very patient but for my DC it only took a couple of times.

Tbh i ignore DS, pick up the food without a word, throw it in the bin, don't offer him any more and get him out of his high chair. But DS is now 17 mo and likes getting any reaction from me - positive or negative. If i say 'no', he invariably smiles at me and does it again, very purposefully. If i ignore it and don't react he quickly gets bored and stops throwing it. And then i praise him when he eats nicely.

Just pick it up. All kids do it at that age. He will soon grow out of it :)

My DD is 11m and doing the same thing. I say no and ask her to give it to me instead. It sometimes works ;)

Just ignore it, it's probably a phasean redirect attention...

Ignore it and get a dog? x

DS started doing this at 11 months. We just ignored it (although sometimes it was hard not to laugh and we did laugh), but did continue to offer food in case he was hungry.

He's now 13 months and stopped doing it a while ago. When he's had enough of eating he picks up his food and hands it to us. Or sometimes just looks at it and says "nonononono".

He grew out of it, really.

I wouldn't do anything - I BLW two of mine and they just do it, sometimes I pick it up and put it back on their tray, otherwise I bin it. 11 months is to young for no.

My DD2 is 11 months and also started chucking food off her highchair table recently. Or rather picking up individual bits and rather ceremoniously just dropping them over the side of the high chair. We give her a lot of finger foods so lots of opportunity to chuck . Although she has an equivalent for when we are spoon-feeding her - she just waves both hands in front of her face, usually just as the spoon is approaching, so yoghurt / soup/ porridge goes flying off the spoon.

It's definitely when she's finished / not interested in eating. I'm sure she's not being naughty. We just stop feeding her. No positive or negative reaction - I usually say something like "ok, no more, you've finished". I think even if it happens at the start of the meal it probably means your DS isn't hungry. At this age if you really are worried he'll be hungry later I might offer something later on (eg rice cake, banana, yoghurt, extra milk).

A few months older, with DD1, she learnt that if she didn't eat what was put in front of her at mealtimes, nothing else would be offered until the next usual snacktime / mealtime. But I agree with others that 11 months is too young to understand this.

Thankyou, i think i will try just ignoring(which i don't think ill find easy!) and if the next item gets chucked finish the meal.

I got warned about the "dropsies" at my sure start centre before it happened by the staff. Your budding scientist is Experimenting with gravity

Ignore he'll grow out it.

It was the only time our older cat used to hang around DS.

My 21 month old does this at dinner time when shes had enough of her food.
Just pick it up, throw it away and offer some more food later.
All kids do this dont worry