16-Month-Old Feeding Milestones: Using Spoons, Cups and Building Mealtime Skills

At 16 months, your toddler is refining their motor skills, and they want to use them. You’ll notice more interest in:

• Using a spoon (with varying success)
• Drinking from cups or straws
• Scooping, dipping, and experimenting
• Using hands as utensils
• Their perfect wardrobe becoming a casualty of mealtimes.

Mess is still very much part of the process.

Offer foods that support these skills. Think thicker textures like yoghurt, mashed meals, or scoopable toddler bowls like Strawberry Chia Pudding, or Lamb and Barley Stew from Le Puree.

Transitioning away from bottles is also important here. Open cups (with or without straws) support oral development and dental health, and encourage independence. They’re also practice for the real world, so there’s no point learning the skills required for bottles, if what they actually need is skills to drink from a cup instead.

Let your toddler practice- even if most of the food doesn’t make it to their mouth. If you over exaggerate and mimic what they should be doing, they can learn via ‘monkey see, monkey do’.