Should a 9 month old be feeding themself?

ShernRich

I'm not a parent yet, so I really don't know, but a friend of mine, her DS and I met for lunch this past week and I noticed that she chopped and mashed some of her food (mashed potatoes, chicken fried steak, macaroni and cheese) from her plate, and put it on a small saucer for DS and proceeded to let him feed himself with a [adult sized] spoon.

I'm very observant these days when it comes to mommies with there little ones- just because I have no experience with babies at all (hence my participation on this board). ?I do, however question some things I see- this being one of them. ?I thought he was too young to feed himself, and was just "playing" with the food and throwing it all over the floor/table instead of eating it. When I questioned her about it she said, "He has to learn to be independent". ?What are your thoughs on this? ??

misjenn

This isn't abnormal my daughter is 10 months and has been feeding herself from about 7-8 months. I take food that is appropriate from my plate and let her feed herself when we are at restaurants. When she was first learning to feed herself she was also learning very important things- hand-eye coordination and texture. Playing with food isn't a bad thing it is actually teaching the child these lessons and independence is one of the lessons as well. I think if your friend feels her child is ready for this stage then he probably is.

ali-1411

I think babies should start feeding themselves as soon as they can.  Layna is 6 months, and today I put a big glob of oatmeal on her tray and just let her go.  It was all over the place...more got in her hair than in her mouth.  But you have to start somewhere

JessHeath

I agree with PP.  The only issue is that it can get very messy.  When we go out to restaurants I try to keep the mess to a minimum and pick up the big stuff before we leave.  But as far as letting them feed themselves, the earlier the better IMO.  I'll give DS a spoon to "use" but really he still eats everyting with his hands and plays with the spoon (we use a kiddie spoon, but have used an adult spoon in a pinch).  But he is getting the feel of using a spoon down and hopefully will be able to spoon feed himself at some point in the near future. 

Kim777

Rhett started feeding himself finger food snacks around 7-8 months and by 9 months he was eating a lot of our food mashed up. Around 11 months we dropped purees completely. He is not using a spoon yet. I try to give him one to practice with sometimes, but it distracts him so much that he doesn't eat. I'm not quite sure what the answer is on that yet for us, but I'm sure at some point he will get the hang of it!

Kristen&Doyle

Clearly there is a wide range of normal on this, but in my experience, Colton has pretty much taken the lead on eating and he was so independent that there was no way around me feeding him at some point. ?I'm not sure it started as young as 9 months, but he was certainly eating food I set out for him by then (because I need to eat too and it's hard eating if I'm tending to him the whole time anyway!). ?Anyway, he started eating with a spoon fairly early too. ?He is just very determined in his fine motor skills and there is little-no way to stop him when he is so determined!

maribel922

My DS is quite the same way. Since about 9 months, he wants to "feed himself." I wrestled with him with the spoon for quite some time before ultimately throwing my hands in the air and just putting out more finger foods. I think it's really sweet for you to care about this issue (gonna be a good mama!), but I wouldn't worry unless you think your friends little one isn't getting enough nutrition. Like PP's said, they are just learning. Usually I let DS play for about 5-10 minutes with the finger food and will then feed him some purees just to make sure something is getting down there.

abbysmom1005

I agree with  pps, totally normal but not necessarily all babies are at this age. Abby has always been very independent and once she started self feeding table foods she wanted nothing at all to do with purees, which was around 7-8 months.  So yes by 9 months she was completely self feeding.  We usually gave her a spoon to practice with but usually she just ate with her fingers. Which as some one else mentioned is great for hand eye coordination.

m_and_m

I can count the number of times I've fed H on one hand. She started self feedingwhen she started solids around 6 mos.

Babies learn by playing, whether it's with food or toys. If they don't play, they don't learn.

mcurban

at that point, while we were out in public, we stuck to more solid things for him to finger feed w/. no waaaaay i would have given jack a spoon and the freedom to do w/ it as he pleased. now, when we are home, that's a different story...

i think for me (as a pp said) it would be the mess factor. either I would have to clean it up or an employee would. either way, it wouldn't be fun.