[mamabear&babybear]

I know that this is an issue that parents have been dealing with since the dawn of time, so hopefully someone has a few ideas. My ten month old throws food out of her high chair. At first, I thought it was her way of telling me she was done. I now know that it is a form of entertainment while she is chewing. I would like a gentle but effective way of teaching her that this is not acceptable behavior. It can be so frustrating and yet so funny sometimes. She likes to throw it, and then laugh at me when I pick it up. She also laughs at me when I tell her no. I tried ending the meal when she started throwing it, but I'm not sure she connected the two events. I am new to this forum and new to the notion of gentle discipline as I was spanked as a child. I have just started disciplining her, and I intend to read some books when I get the time . Thanks for any ideas you have.

 

[BoobyMamma]

i went through this with ds and dh and family went crazy because of it. dc will make the connection that throwing food signifies the end of a meal if you are consistent. There is no need to be harsh or negative - just say "You must be all done. We don't throw our food." If dc protests because not finished then say "Oh, okay, I thought you were finished because food was being thrown." A good babysigns book can help - the "all done" sign is what ceased our food throwing - and my commitment to consistently react in the same way. If dc thinks you are amused behaviour will continue. Even if you don't feel food is thrown because dc is finished eating, introducing the sign can be a great diversion and will give dc something else to focus on. This will pass. . .Good luck!

 

[Piglet68]

It's pretty normal for kids that age to drop ANYTHING off their high chairs. My DS does this with chew toys, spoons, etc. They are just figuring out about gravity and I think treating it as a special case because it's "food" is making an issue out of something that isn't there.

If your child is already walking you can just feed them from your own plate. We started doing this when DD was a bit over a year old. No food for her to play with, no high chair from which to launch objects. It also just didn't seem fun for her to drop food when she was not above the ground, kwim? We gave her finger foods that weren't going to make a big mess if they got left around on the floor.

 

[abac]

We let him. We put newspaper down under his chair for easy clean up. He's only 14 mo. I just don't see it as a big deal. It's fun for him and he's learning by doing it. We also taught him a sign for "all done," but didn't get a book...we just make up our own signs. He uses "all done" whenever he wants out of his seat at the table or out of his car seat. We respond immediately when he uses it at the table.

 

[nancy926]

Interesting that you say your DC is "laughing at you"...sounds like she found a hot-button issue.

I remember basically ignoring the behavior in DD. We would ask her if she was all done (also used sign language with her) but otherwise didn't acknowledge it. Part of the "fun" is getting a reaction from mom or dad, yk? DD did stop doing it after awhile. I agree it's just a developmental thing - they are learning that they can make things happen.

Now, at 2.5 years old, if she were to throw food I would say something like "food stays on the plate", and if it happened again I'd say "I guess you're all done with your dinner" and take the plate away. But at 10 mos I don't believe she would understand all that.

 

[CJNeeley]

Ok, I kinda feel it's age appropriate and not too big a deal. But honestly, I was pregnant when my oldest started this so I was just too darn tired and lazy to try too much negotiating. So I got a plastic mat (something we got free but was meant to be a playmat for older kids) and stuck that under his chair and ignored him. If we laughed or asked him to stop (or did anything it seemed) he would just do it more, so I just planned on him doing it--and we just didn't let him feed himself anything more than a breadstick or roll if we were at someone else's house--and once he ate and/or threw all his food on the floor we took his empty plate and would say "all done." I eventually got the idea to put less on his plate so he'd not really be able to fill up with half his plate dumped and he caught on that he didn't get to eat what he wasted on the floor (and we didn't often have leftovers) so he gradually threw less and ate more. And once he was old enough to understand that we could save his leftovers and he could eat them later he stopped throwing food. So maybe I kinda lucked into it or maybe it's just a phase that'll resolve itself if you don't encourage/discourage it. Of course I now ask if they are done eating all the time when they do any type of 'inappropriate' play (or at least what I feel is inappropriate), if they say yes we take their plate if they say no we say something like 'then you might want to eat.' And that works really well with them, worked on the younger one around a year old but I think part of that was because he wanted to be like his big brother more than because he really cared what we were doing--but who knows.