Straws and Sipping Success

I can drink from a straw.

There are moments when I wonder if all of the effort I put in to teaching Baby Buckshot things has any real effect on his advancement. After all, he's going to learn how to walk, talk and break things all on his own anyway.

But recently I read that learning how to drink from a straw is actually critical to linguistic development. Where drinking from a soft spouted sippy cup is much like drinking from a bottle and drinking from a hard spout or lidless cup uses reflexes that baby has from birth, drinking from a straw forces babies to develop muscles in their mouths not previously used. The same muscles that are necessary to pronounce some words.

Naturally, I was determined it teach BB how to drink from a straw. I've tried before and he just sits there waiting for me to drop water in with mouth with the straw because I've done that before.

Yesterday, I tried giving him a cup with a straw. Same lack of sucking motion on his part. Then I dropped water into his mouth from the straw and he did like a hamster with a water bottle does. Then, I held the end of the straw closed, forcing him to suck to get the water out. He successfully learned how to suck on a straw but when offered the cup with a straw again, he went back to his "waiting for a dropper" attitude.

I tried the whole process again but then started lowering the end of the straw I was holding lower and lower until it would sit in a cup. Then, voila, he got it. From start to finish, it took him about 5-10 minutes to figure it out.

Now he's drinking from a straw like a pro and I'm feeling pretty good about my teaching skills. Next up, identifying colors.