How do you teach to use a hard spout or straw sippy cup?

charmcitygirl

Jacob does terrific with a Nuby soft spout sippy cup for water only.  (He won't drink WCM out of it at all...that is a whole 'nother issue.)

Anyway, I've given him a couple of different sippy cups to try the hard spout or the straw ones and he just has no idea what to do with it.  He either bites on it, just sits there with it in his mouth without sipping, or refuses it all together.

I've tried taking the valve out of the sippies with a valve, but that doesn't seem to do it.  And it doesn't help with a straw sippy.

Any advice?

MrsJeffsWife2B

I just demonstrated to jasper how to suck, really exaggerated.. it's not that different than sucking a bottle, so if you keep at it he should get it!

The part that he really had trouble with was figuring out that you can't tilt your head back with a straw cup (unlike a sippy!) or it actually makes it so there is NO water.

I felt bad for him, it IS confusing LOL!

InACitySoNice

You can try dipping the straw into the liquid, putting your finger on top of the straw so the liquid stays inside, and then, while holding it, letting your LO "suck" the liquid out.  Little by little, they catch on that you get the drink by sucking.  Then you can put the straw inside the cup ...

TxJen1972

Bella just learned to drink from a straw about a week or so ago.  She was drinking from the soft spout sippy's and I had bought some of the sippy's with a straw, but she couldn't figure it out.  So one day I decided to tilt the straw one back and she learned if she sucked that water came out.  After that she just started sucking on the straw ones (or straws from a regular cup) and she prefers these now.

RoxBride

To teach her to use a real cup (just a hard spout, no valve tippy cup) we all three say down to dinner and used the cups.  Once she saw us drinking from them, she of course wanted to follow suit at the dinner table, and after a couple tries, had it figured out.  Eventually we just took the spout off so now she drinks from a regular open cup with handles.  From time to time she spills, and if we don't want to deal with the spill, we use a smaller dixie cup.

We did the same thing with straw cups. 

brideinOC

I'm not sure how she figured it out, but she just did one day in a restaurant.  It took a few dribbles but she thinks she's hot stuff now. 

laura&dan05

Hannah learned how to drink out of a straw before a sippy so we're kind of backwards. Lol!  It started by giving her a smoothie in a cup with a straw.  She LOVES smoothies and we usually make them a few mornings a week.  I would suck up some smoothie in the straw and put my finger under the bottom of the straw.  She just had a small amount in the straw to try and suck out.  She'd watch me suck on the straw and started to get the hang of it.  I think it helped that it was something really sweet that she really wanted.  It took awhile before she got the hang of it.

The downside for us was that it took her forever to learn that she had to tip the sippy cup back to drink out of it.