How can I teach my toddler to take bites?

I swear everything I had her - she just shoves it in her mouth until she gags. I see other babies take nice bites...chew...then another bite...

How can I teach her to do that? I end up taking things away and cutting them into small pieces and even then she will pick it up, in the mouth, then put another...and another...so I then take those away and hand them one at a time.

ETA: she's 1 1/2

Message edited 5/9/2008 9:09:29 AM.

Re: How can I teach my toddler to take bites?

Some kids are just stuffers...my eldest daughter was this way. She's still, at 14, like this. She takes the biggest bites...We used to show her how to take little bites by taking really small bites ourselves..(I dont know if it helped at all)

I know we have some speech pathologists on here that might have some pointers for you (they handle feeding issues)...

Re: How can I teach my toddler to take bites?

Thanks. And it's not even like she's a hog...she just is a shover...she used to take bites. I feel like cutting it up in small pieces makes it worse...because then anything that's on her tray she thinks she can handle in one bite.

Re: How can I teach my toddler to take bites?

I have the same problem with DS!! He's almost 13 months. I also end up taking things away and breaking them up for him. He'll shove about 6 puffs in his mouth at a time! I gave him an arrowroot cookie the other day, and he took too big of a bite and ended up with a big chunk in his mouth. I panicked, took it out and broke it up. I don't know if I'm making it worse. Maybe it's better to let them figure it out. I don't know...

Re: How can I teach my toddler to take bites?

I have a shover toddler myself

I stopped cutting things up into small pieces, big enough so the food wouldn't fit in the mouth no matter how hard she tried.

Like grilled cheese-i cut it in half or quarters.

I had to show DD how to bite, I'd bite it first and say bite, take a bite, then let her do it. She'll get the hang of it. Just keep making her take bites while you hold it, then let her do it. She'll feel a sense of accomplishment

GL