Cutlery at 20mths? Nursery issue : (

[spongebrainbigpants]

DS is 20 mths and mainly eats with his hands - we did BLW, so he's always fed himself and doesn't really use cutlery. We do put cutlery out at mealtimes, and he sometimes uses it but then gets bored and goes back to using his hands (up until recently he even ate yoghurt with his hands which was impressive to watch! ).

Anyway, we weren't remotely worried about this until dh picked him up from nursery today and the nursery nurse asked whether we fed him. Dh was a bit taken aback at first thinking was she asking if we fed him enough! But what she meant was did we feed him with spoons. When dh said no, he feeds himself, she said they'd tried to make him use his cutlery at lunchtime and he'd had such a meltdown he'd fallen asleep at the table .

He didn't get many more details (he was shell shocked tbh), but I can't believe they upset him so much about something so trivial. I can't bear the thought of my happy little man being told off for something so unimportant.

I'm going to have a word with them next week, but just wanted a quick straw poll - is it especially unusual for him to be eating with his hands at 20 mths, should we be doing more to make him use cutlery, and if so how?!

Don't want him to be upset like this, but feel it should be our choice when he does this and the nursery should have spoken to us first .

E sometimes uses cutlery and sometimes doesn't, but it's always there. If he eats that's the main thing!!

We have a mixture of cutlery and hands too.

I don't think there is anything you can do to make them use cutlery at this age apart from put it out, and eat at the same time as them using cutlery yourself. Hopefully they will be motivated to copy (eventually).

So sad though that A was made to be so upset over this.

DS was using cutlery at 20months - I remember because that's when DD was born so it was important to me that he could feed himself.
DD was blw and was later at using cutlery, I don't think blw babies see the point of cutlery when they are so independent already! But nursery were fine about it. Well, more than fine, she was their first blw baby and a
bit of a mealtime celebrity

it does sound like your ds was tired though, I'd check carefully with the nursery. And make sure they know about blw.

Well let's face it we have these fantastic built in tools already - hands!! Now my Ds has self fed and used cutlery from 12 months, but that is just him, but when all is said and done, I bet we could all cram more in more efficiently if we'd just used our hands It does seem to have been taken too far, poor little mite, although maybe he just had a flip out as no one has ever challenged him and i suppose that could happen now or in 12 months time.

The thing is, sometimes they get in such a state that it is so hard to then get through to them, even if they just let him eat with his hands, sometimes they get so upset. I think you should speak to them and find out exactly how it was handled though.

both my boys have fallen asleep at the table before, DS1 used to do it often at nursery mid-meal, but never while crying. I think you need to find out the whole story and then react - if it was a minor strop and he was tired then maybe he did fall asleep relatively calmly after putting his foot down about the cutlery issue. (Hoping it was this for you!).

That being said, I would definitely ask nursery to consider that A's table manners can include feeding himself with his hands. There's many things we work on with the boys, like not touching us and each other while their hands are covered in food, waiting for their friends to be served, sitting still, not playing too much with their food etc (still working on this with Ds1) that have nothing to do with a fork. In my experience nursery staff can get too caught in routine and might not take the time to think through that there are other ways of doing things.

ok some kids do fall asleep just like that. but I think the OP would know her son well enough to know if that was likely or not.

I know if it were any of my 3 it simply wouldn't have happened, none of them have EVER just fallen asleep, not mid-meal, not mid-anything! it's taken being in bed, with a comforter etc etc to get them to go off, so i know if it had been my son then it would have been a lot of crying before he was exhausted enough to actually fall asleep.

BTW my 20 year old lodger can't use a knife. He can only use forks and spoons. The MESS he made yesterday eating a cornish pasty, chips and peas using only a fork. Grrrrr.

BTW my 20 year old lodger can't use a knife. He can only use forks and spoons. The MESS he made yesterday eating a cornish pasty, chips and peas using only a fork. Grrrrr.

So cross I posted twice

In my experience it's not hard to upset a 20 month old so much that they have a meltdown, but maybe my two were just sensitive souls. I always put it down to their being normal toddlers though.

Fimble, my 11 yr old ds2 sounds like your lodger! He will pick up a whole chicken breast with a fork and eat the sides off it till it's gone. He has dyspraxia though.

I agree with SD.

Maybe they tried to encourgae him to use cutlery, he got upset and after a few attempts, they tried to feed him themselves but he was too worked up to do that (this has happened to me with my DSs on a number of occasions when they were around that age). So, they left him for a bit to look check on other children, turned around and found him asleep in his chair?

I agree with those who say go and get the full story before blazing your guns . It's very hard for a parent when you hear your little one gets upset when you are not around to witness why - I still do!

Thank you for all your input - have just spoken to the nursery and they did accept that it would have been better to have spoken to us first before making an issue out of DS using his cutlery.

They did keep asking him to use it and he got more and more upset until they eventually had to spoonfeed him and then he fell asleep.

So I think he was tired anyway, and they picked a bad day to push him on it.

The nursery nurse I spoke to was a little worried I was cross with her, and I explained it was fine, but we just needed to be consistent. I also explained about BLW which she accepted would mean that DS has a slightly different take on cutlery cos he's not used to using it!

I wasn't going to go in all guns blazing - as a teacher I know how annoying it is for everyone to assume you're the baddy before anyone asks you for clarification!

Thanks for all your advice. I will endeavour to try and help my messy little boy use his cutlery, but hope he doesn't start trying to eat toast with a spoon!

I have a four month old at home too, and am tired and hormonal, which made the thought of my gorgeous boy crying himself to sleep even harder to bear.

I think the nursery could have handled it better but it doesn't seem as if it was as bad as it could have been. I do think they have a bit of a one size fits all policy (and we're guilty of doing this at school too) which makes it hard when your DC don't 'fit' at the right time.

Thanks again for your help .

I'm glad they fed him themselves before he fell asleep, poor sweetie!

Me too! I spoke to a couple of friends today who have kids at the same nursery and were not impressed .

Hopefully all sorted now though . . .