My nearly 2yo is not using cutlery at all....

[CrushWithEyeliner]

if i don't spoon/ fork it to her mouth she will not eat. I have tried leaving it but it doesn't work. At what age should this be a norm?

Most kids will know how to use a knife and fork by the time they leave home

my dd1 was about 3 when she could control the spoon, ds is nearly 3 and if its not his hands i feed him with a spoon, and dd2 is 1 so thats not a problem

my little brother will kill me for saying this but he was still spoon fed at 7-8 years old

try not to worry they will get there its harder for boys to develop the skills needed to do it.

hth mt3 x

She is very young. I would try giving her a spoon but feeding her at the same time. Don't stress if she doesn't use it but just make sure she has one.

bet she would eat if shou didn't

i bet you a million pounds.

she might miss a meal

she might miss two.

bet she eats the third one though. even if its just with her fingers.

i too was always very much of the 'it will come' school of thought, its not like she will be using her fingers to eat soup when she is 15, these things come. they do. don't worry, stop pandering

DD is 20 mo and was BLW. She mostly ignores cutlery. When she does pick up a spoon most of the food goes AWOL before it reaches her mouth. She's pretty efficient with fingers though, so I pretend not to mind.

Thank you all so much for your reassurance. It must be just coincidence that all her friends seems to eat really well!

Custy you are right! I need to stop being so at hand with the spoon - but she has never really been that enthusiastic about food and is a little tiddler - I wan t to fatten her up lol

Crushwitheyeliner, in our house we use fingers and fork and spoon. AS long as she enjoys her food. They go through a little fussiness at that age don't reinforce it. My Ds is 4 and my Mum is a really good, foreign style cook and Ds eats almost everything except mushrooms, lettuce, (cabbage as well unless nan cooks it) he has two friends who also eats anything last week they had paella together this week lancastershire hot pot. I have another friend that I can only serve fish fingers. Hey Oh! Don't try fatten kids up or you start cooking two or three meals in one sitting, just to get them to eat. they will eat if they are hungry. remember she is not in a war torn part of the world searching for bugs to eat!

My DS is 2 and does not feed himself much strangely though he tries much harder when it's icecream or fromage fraise.

I can't remember what age, but do remember that I always gave ds a spoon to use, as well as spoon feeding him. Then I'd put in the occasional spoonful, feed myself, and talk to dh, so that I fed ds quite slowly. If he wanted the food a bit quicker, he would spoon some for himself.

He picked it up pretty quickly as I recall.

Oh, and cos they don't know if they're left or right handed at that age, try giving her a spoon in each hand. At least she'll get used to the feel of them.

Does she feed herself with finger food at all?

I had a tough time getting dd to feed herself. What worked for us (she was about 2.5) was 'taking turns' with the spoon and also 'counting spoonfuls'. I still feed her a bit - but at least now I know she can do it when she needs to.

DS is 6 and will still use fingers if he can get away with it

mumtoo3 - can DS use a fork?