We had tried teaching Darius how to self-feed soon after he turned 1 year old but it didn’t go on successfully, as he wasn’t really interested to do so.

As the CC was using small soup spoon for the children during their meals, and using the same type of spoon for the activities, we decided to get a small soup spoon (Puku brand) for him too. Previously, we were still using the Munchkin spoon which has a long handle and his hand takes a longer distance to travel to his mouth, dropping food in the process.

We started using the Puku spoon for his cereal and porridge and encouraged him to self-feed with the cereal. Sometimes, Catherine would let him self-feed a few mouthfuls of the porridge but that is more difficult as he did not know how to stop feeding and kept putting the spoon to his mouth even when he had not finished chewing.

Soon, the first signs that he might be ready to self-feed surfaced last Friday, when I was fetching Darius from his CC. As I was putting on his shoes, one of his teachers told me that Darius was trying to feed himself during lunch as the teachers were busy with the other children then. However, as they were serving ‘Kway Teow’ (strips of ricecake that are slippery), he had difficulty scooping them up every time though he was persistent in trying.

It was good news to Catherine and I but we didn’t really make too much notice of it at that time.

Then in the next morning, after I prepared his breakfast cereal in a bowl and left it on the high chair with Darius in it, I walked off a short moment to pick up something on the floor. When I returned, I saw him picking up the spoon from the bowl himself and started to put a scoop of cereal into his mouth! He might be either too hungry (unlikely since he had his milk feed not too long ago) or just wanting to feed himself without relying on us. ^^

Keeping up his momentum, I encouraged him to continue scooping up more mouthfuls of cereal. Though he could scoop them up from the bowl without difficulty, he tend to tilt the spoon while moving it towards his mouth, causing some (and sometimes, almost all) of the cereal in the spoon to fall off. Although I know it’s inevitable it will get messy while a child learns to self-feed, I still couldn’t help but guided him by holding his hand since I’m not used to see food being wasted. ^^|

Later in the evening, after Darius finished his porridge for dinner and was to have his pureed mango (one of his favourite fruits) for dessert, he took over the spoon and started to self-feed himself again:

It’s nice to see him gaining independence day by day, and we will look forward to more signs of him being independent in other aspects too! ^^

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