At What Age...

[cassa333]

Do you think children should be competent at using a knife and fork?

[Buenchico]

The 'Development of Feeding Skills' table here would seem to be relevant:
http://www.hertschs.nhs.uk/Library/Children_Services/Childrens_OT/Childrens%20OT%20Developing%20Feeding%20skills%20December%202011.pdf

[jno]

goodness knows, it's like saying is there an age at which they should be walking. Four or five maybe but I wouldn't be amazed if it was earlier or later. They might need to know how to cut up school meals.

[cassa333]

How about 7 yrs?

It frustrates me no end when out of about 60 kids only about a dozen (if you're lucky) can use a knife and fork in the right manner. So many of them stab the food with the fork and chew the food off as if it were a chicken drumstick.

Oh well.

[Buenchico]

Do you care which way up the tines of the fork are, Cassa?

[cassa333]

Sometimes not lol

But honestly I see so many 7yr olds unable to even hold a fork properly. If they even bother to pick up the knife they hold both as if they are about to stab the plate.

It does sadden me that so many parents don't teach their kids how to.

It is really REALLY noticeable when they sit next to the one on the table that knows how to do it.

But ha ho that's the way the world seems to be going.

[Hypognosis]

@cassa333

By infant school age, I was perfectly capable of dissecting out the fatty and gristley bits from the meat and leaving them on the side of the plate, which would lead to threats, from the senior dinnerlady, that I'd be denied pudding if I didn't clean the plate*. (This chivvied bystanders along in finishing their meat but the threat never came to pass. Either I thought up a sneaky workaround or it was a more kindly dinnerlady who actally dished out the puddings).

* One of the spoken inserts on Pink Floyd's "The Wall", where the schoolmaster character says much the same thing, reawakens that memory, every time I hear it.

[Cloverjo]

I remember when my son was about 4 and a friend of my then O.h came round for a meal. He was amazed that my son could use a knife and fork properly. He said his sister was a couple of years older, but she couldn't.
If a child doesn't have physical problems, I'd say 7 years old should be the limit.

[murraymints]

by the time they start school..along with self dressing..shoelace tying and toileting needs...

[waterboatman]

My parents had all four of us using a knife and fork, not always with a lot of skill, at 4. By 5 we could do a proper job.

[murraymints]

I was reading The Scotsman and all of the above by the time I started school !

[1ozzy]

My 4 kids could handle the weapons with some skill by 3 - 4 years old.
Tricky food they needed a hand with, but not for long.

[Sqad]

I was taught at an early age and by 7 years old, I could use a knife and fork and could lay out the positions of a knife fork, spoon (soup) dessert cutlery and knew which to use with each course.


\\\Buenchico
Do you care which way up the tines of the fork are, Cassa?\\\

But as Buenchico says......." who cares?"....now.

[mikey4444]

Never, if the evidence I see around me these days is true !

I went to school when I was 5 years old in 1958, and my Mum had already taught me the basics of table manners, although I am fairly sure that I was able to eat properly before that.

In the course of my work, I see the insides of many people houses and so many people, especially at the lower end of society, don't even have a table and four chairs, so it isn't surprising that table manners are getting rare. They all have huge tellys and leather sofas though !

I recall the first time I went to America, with Freddie Laker in the late 70's, and a waitress in a New York steakhouse said that she could tell that I was British, by the way I used my knife and fork !

It was so quaint apparently !

[Sqad]

Morning mikey

\\I recall the first time I went to America, with Freddie Laker in the late 70's,\\

Big mates were you?.....;-)

[Cloverjo]

There was an article in the paper the other day about how more Brits are eating the American way by cutting their food with the knife in their right hand, putting the knife down and picking up the fork in the right. It all looks very awkward to me, but I guess they think our way is awkward with our tines down approach even while trying to eat peas.

[Mosaic]

'Polite' dining has changed over time so lets cut the kids some slack. It was 'polite' to cut up your food with your own pocket knife, and eat (delicately) with your fingers, until the 1600s. So in those times the ill mannered would stab at and chomp up their food. In the 1700s polite diners were warned not to wipe their noses on the trailing edge of the tablecloth.....but no problem with a servant bringing you a pot at table if you needed a wee. Mrs Beeton invented soup spoons, fish knives and 'courses' all requiring separate plates - she must have been the darling of Victorian shopkeepers.
For me, the rule is intention and consideration. Try not to inconvenience or revolt anyone else, and show appreciation to the cook/ servers, and then what's not to like?
If the kids are eating their dinners, that's a good sign in itself. They can get all excited when together and act in a way that they don't when at home, so maybe the answer is to not have all of them sat down at once. Complex, I know, but not impossible.

[mikey4444]

Morning Sqad !

Freddie, single-handed, allowed us Brits to afford to visit the States. A wonderful man !

Cloverjo...I will let you into a secret, as long as you promise not to tell anyone !

.....I stopped using my fork that way to eat peas a long time ago...
I now use my fork like a shovel ! ( hides his head in shame )

[Old_Geezer]

Is the States visit and fork use connected ?

[mikey4444]

It probably is OG !