nursery-inspired crisis of confidence....

[JessaJam]

DS is 11 months and has been happily chomping away on solids for a while now, he eats all sorts of interesting things, but his meals are always fed to him (I had never even heard of BLW until about a month ago...). If you hand him a breadstick/bit of food off own plate etc he will happily sit and eat it as finger food.

Then, nursery ask if he has finger food yet as his lunches (which I provide) are "still quite mashed up" ( well, yes, he is 11 months...?) "yes" says DH "he has breadsticks/lumps of this and that"

So now, twice, nursery have commente donhow he "isn't too good" with finger food and suggested to DH that his hand eye coordination isn't up to it yet ( WTF there's nothing wring with his hand eye coordination if it's something he wants) They are giving him finger foood as a whole meal, leaving him to self-feed...
But I don't think he is use dto the concept that he can/needs to feed himself for a meal yet. I also suspect the nursery may be pushing this so they have less to do (IYSWIM) than spoon-feeding him...

I am now trying to give him a piece of finger food with each meal to get him used to the idea...

I thought he was doing really well and was quite chuffed with myself for getting him to eat pretty chunky, roughly mashed stuff...
What do you think...?

sorry it's so long! HAs been 'brewing' for a while...menat to post earlier but got distracted by all the fun of the fluff et al!

I think thats a bit poor of the nursery to expect him to feed everything to himself at that age ( IMHO) I feel that they are probably rushed for time and and want to get the meal over with as soon as possible without any help from them.

At this age most of it can end up on the floor, they need encouragement to eat and also someone should be sitting with him all the time incase of choking. Also to amke sure he has sufficient to eat. Self feeding can take a long while!

I sit with all my mindies, I spoon feed some but let the baby pick up food for herself and it is a combination of both, if she has some in her hand I wait till she's put it in, then the next mouthful is normally the spoon.

I think you are doing the right thing, just keep adding stuff that he can self feed and it will gradually take over.

I don't let them self feed yoghurt!!

I didn't spoon-feed ds at that age, but I don't think it's wrong - I was just too lazy to do it .

I'd like to say don't worry, it'll sort itself out soon, but I remember I found weaning a total stress. Could you do a mixture of spoon-feeding and finger food at home and see how he gets on with it?

i'm also a bit worried about the food he gets at Nursery...wednesday he had "pizza and salad sticks"...wtf?

Freshly-made pizza (with fresh veg on top and decent cheese) is really nutritious - they need a lot of calories at that age, so it's not as unhealthy as it can be for an adult.

Do they make the food on site or heat up pre-packed food?

well, when we visited before ds started they had a cook...but now they seem to have a catering van turn up and deliver crates...(not that we have been told the cook has left...?)

Not bothered at all by idea of freshly made, veg/cheese/tomato pizza...
and don't get me wrong, quite happy for ds to munch on a 'finger' of pizza from our takeway or a chip or 4 - as a taste/texture etc experience IYKWIM but not as a whole meal and regularly...

JessaJam, the nursery should not be pressurising your ds to feed himself. If he is not interested/ready, they should spoonfeed him. 11 months is still little and children start to hand feed at different rates. Dd's nursery never made any mention of this, even though I knew she was slower than other children.

I say this as a mother of a baby who did not reach for anything until she was 7 months who looked on in wonderment at an 8 month old feeding herself a wotsit!

At 2.10, my dd now handfeeds and, if she can be bothered to, uses a spoon, fork and attempts cutting motions with a blunt knife. Uses the scissors brilliantly. All in good time.

BTW your ds is doing very well with his solids.

Thank you ...I thought he was...

I'm still sending him in with a lunch that can really only be fed to him...not finger food at all, mashed up stuff etc so at least I know he gets a full lunch, even if his tea ends up mainly on the floor..

we are also looking at another nursery! Just in case!

Jessajam

Please don't get down about it - if it makes you feel better DS is 15 months and I did not give him finger food until he was at least a year old.

He was rubbish at chewing but could hoover down mushed food like no tomorrow.

It will come gradually and now DS (15 months) is great with finger food.

To be honest I was paranoid about choking and probably kept his food quite babyish when I should have been braver with it.

But it has not stopped him eating properly now. Even then I would never give him raw vegetables etc (cooked to soften etc)

I do think though that using a spoon is good since that also helps with hand eye co-ordination. DS can use a spoon on his own and I don't have to do anything now but let him get on with it. The only thing that's quite funny is that he often prefers to use a sppon to eat "finger" food - eg raspberries and banana.

I think what you are doing is fine.

everything my dd eats is fingerfood. even porridge. iyswim. it also means that at times i have to strip her off in the highchair and take her straight for a bath too. she likes being fed and like to feed herself so in one sitting, we do a combination of both. by the way, she is 14 months old and there is nothing wrong with her coodination. try that approach to nursery. I am saddened by the implication that the nursery only wants to give certain types of food because it is 'easier' for them to feed.

my dd2 is 7mths old next week and likes to hold some food and chew on it herself (i.e. rice cakes, rusks, fruit in one of these \link{Munchkin® Healthflow® Fresh Food Feeder 2-Pack\fresh food feeder} but the bulk of her meals are still off a spoon, fed by me. Otherwise her or the floor would be wearing most of it! So if I feed her something myself and then she munches on some finger food, at least I have an idea of what she has actually eaten, not just played with. (dd2 has dropped from 9th to 2nd percentile for weight recently so I'm wanting to pay a bit more attention to what she is actually swallowing and digesting....)
Have you spoken to the nursery manager or the room manager about this? It's up to you to decide when your child moves onto the next stage, not the nursery.

bugger, here's the link again
fresh food feeder