Dropping food, similar question to throwing things.

lukafoo74

My 13 month old son likes to sort and then sometimes drop his food on the floor. Some of it he drops and some of it he eats. I usually just ignore the food he drops on the floor because he continues to eat the other food on his tray and then I sweep up the floor after he is done eating. Sometimes there is a lot of food on the floor and sometimes there is barely any.

Usually I don't make a big deal out of it. I am kind of assuming at some point he will stop. I can't find any reason for why he drops some food. Sometimes it is something he likes.

Anyway, it becomes a bigger concern when we go out to a restaurant and he starts dropping food all over the floor.  I generally clean up the mess and tip the server well, but I would love to find some sort of work around for these situations.

As you can tell, I kind of avoid reacting to behavior that I don't like, unless he is putting himself in danger. I am still kind of new at this whole discipline thing, he is usually pretty compliant for a little guy , but I am expecting that to change over the next 12 to 24 months. Thoughts?

desdemona39

I did exactly what you do- pick it up later, and if we're out, tip the server well (as well as pick up whatever I could). I take it as a lesson in gravity- if you drop it, you don't get it back. Also, I found my DD would drop more when she was done eating and bored at the end of a meal, so I taught her the sign for "all done", and she would sign to me and I would take her tray away. She eventually outgrew it.

ETA I also noticed she would drop things she didn't like, so I asked her to give it to me instead.

TiffanyBerry

If this works for you, stick with it.

For us, dropping food on the ground wasn't ok.  We didn't want her learning to feed the dog, or do it other places, and it was something we decided we would address.  But you don't have to, if it's working for you!  For us to address it, we would ask her to give us the food or put it on the table (in front of her tray) instead.  We started slow, but it was a rule in our house, so she got the "warning, reminder of what to do", "warning, reminder of what to do, telling of the consequence", and then "reminder of what she shouldn't do, she should have done, and follow through on consequence".  Our consequence, at first, was taking away almost all of her food.  Then it was getting her down from the table.

But, I really want to stress, if it's working for you and your family, there's no particular need to change it until it doesn't work.

lukafoo74

Thanks all! I have been a little lax with signing, so I can try that approach and I think I will try asking him to give me the food he doesn't want. Thanks for the thoughts!