Chewing Skills: A Surprising Key to Fewer Tantrums and Better Growth

Did you know teaching your baby or toddler how to bite and chew is a cornerstone of their healthy development? 

It’s more than just mealtime manners—it impacts eating habits, speech and language skills, and even their ability to self-regulate (yes, that means fewer tantrums and meltdowns!).

In this episode of Talking Toddlers, we’re uncovering the fascinating ways biting and chewing shape your child’s overall wellbeing. From building essential oral motor skills to supporting emotional balance, this topic is packed with surprising insights you need to know.

I’ll guide you through FOUR major areas of development tied to this simple but essential skill and share 10 PRACTICAL TIPS to help your little one master biting and chewing. 

Whether you’re a parent, grandparent, or caregiver, this episode is a game-changer for understanding how small actions lead to big results in your child’s growth.

Get ready to chew on some eye-opening info (pun intended)! Tune in now!

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Transcript

0:00

Because that's a way for you to start to evaluate in what I'm always sharing here with you, evaluate where you are. What are you doing now? How can you do it differently? Where are they? Are they on track? Are they a little bit behind, a little bit ahead? And what can you do to help them close those gaps when necessary?

Erin: 0:22

Hello, and welcome to Talking Toddlers, where I share more than just tips and tricks on how to reduce tantrums or build your toddler's vocabulary. We're going to cover all of that, but here, our goal is to develop clarity. Because in this modern world, it's truly overwhelming. This podcast is about empowering moms to know the difference between fact and fiction, to never give up, to tap into everyday activities so your child stays on track. He's not falling behind. He's thriving through your guidance. We know that true learning starts at home. So let's get started.

1:07

today, we are diving into something so fundamental yet often overlooked teaching your baby and toddler, how to bite and chew. Believe it or not. This simple act is key to their healthy development in many, many surprising ways from the basic eating habits to speech and language development, even their ability to self regulate. And what does self regulate mean? Less tantrums, less meltdowns, easier transitions. We're going to break down how biting and chewing influence your child's overall wellbeing, and what you mama, daddy, grandparents can do to help them master this crucial skill. Today I will cover four major areas that affect this development. And then I will highlight 10 tips that can support mastery of this crucial skill. The first major area centers around healthy eating and the immunity system. Let's look at it, basically, That proper chewing actually boosts your child's immune system. And that's true for you and me as well, but now we're looking at your baby and your toddler and your preschooler. How can you set the stage for a healthier, stronger immunity? And what I like to do here is kind of set up what would be ideal. And then you, mom, dad, grandparents, you try it out. You try to implement it in real time in your life and you tweak it and mold it to fit your lifestyle. So ideally us humans. And again, when I talk about especially eating and chewing and all of this. It relates to your baby toddlers and children, teenagers, and you and me. So when we take a bite of food, if we chew it 30 to 40 times before we swallow, then we are releasing gut hormones that aid in digestion and proper satiety. And so tidy means that your child and older children. Really learned to recognize when they're full. And that is part of the interoceptive. One of the sensory perceptions that we have, that we have to help our child develop over time in these first several years. When am I hungry? When am I full? When do I have to go to the toilet? When do I feel hot or cold or thirsty or cranky or. Tired all of these interoceptive it's when we are in tune with our internal organs and one of them is built around those early stages of biting, chewing and eating. So this process by chewing foods, 30 to 40 times encourages healthy eating habits and a better nutrient absorption. I mean, it does make sense, right? If we're just shoving food in our mouth, barely chewing it. And we're just gulping it down, which all of us do from time to time. Right. We're in a hurry or eating in the car, shame on us. Uh, and I'm as guilty as all of them. Were, you know, mindlessly eating in front of the computer. We're trying to do three or four things. Multitasking doesn't work you. And I know this, but. If we break it down and say, okay, Let's carve this time out for eating. As a family, or even if it's just you and your toddler, let's do it with intention. Let's do it purposefully. Let's see if we can choose 20, 30, 40 times ideally. this process, as I said, builds a healthy eating habit. And nutrient absorption, which then what does that do lead into stronger immunity. That's where our immunity system is. Shaped and encouraged and rubbed and, and lubricated sorta speak. Right. if we have a poor diet, if we're not eating well, then that just begins to trickle down into a lot of other. Human biology elements. And then we're run down. We're tired, we're bad sleepers. We're, you know, moody and it becomes this vicious catch 22. So teaching good chewing habits early lays that foundation for a lifetime. Of healthier eating patterns. And you'll see how all of these four major areas. Influence and connect to one another and let's always be stepping back and looking at. What is our goal for that three-year-old and that five-year-old, and that seven-year-old, and that ten-year-old. We start now at birth. But as we introduce solid foods at about six months of age, And I promote here, baby led weaning. That's another conversation, but if you haven't heard of it, just Google it. Um, but I've talked about it a number of times here. And that is the beginning, right? When you're introducing foods for purpose, right. Other than the bottle or the breast for nutrients. Now you begin at six months and eight months and 10 months to really help them build. That relationship with food. So now let's look at number two of these four major areas. It helps build oral motor skills. Which are the building blocks for speech. And when I talk about oral motor skills, sometimes I think we in my field forget that. The jargon I am used to may not be so user-friendly, but oral just means the mouth and motor, whenever any of us therapists or. Medical practitioners. Use the word motor, we mean muscle, right? So the muscles in the mouth that we need for speech are the same muscles in our mouth that we use and develop for chewing and eating. So we need to really help your little ones. Learn how to quote unquote, work out all of those muscles. As your child begins to bite and then chew. They strengthen the muscles in their jaw, lips and tongue. And I've mentioned here before, but we have about 100 muscles from our diaphragm up. That we use for speech and eating and chewing. Now there are, we can zone in on 26 muscles of the mouth only. But when I talk about the jaw muscle, And the lips and the tongue. These are skills that are critical, not just for eating, but for clear, concise, articulate speech. Remember they'll coup and then they'll Babel and babbling is just putting a bunch of different sounds together. In different strings, but those sounds are strung together. To then create words. And words are strung together to create sentences and sentences are strung together to create. Conversational flow. And when we co articulate, that means we're moving all of these hundred muscles, right there includes the breathing that inhalation. And the exhalation as speech is produced, but those 26 muscles in the mouth that are really moving very precisely. For stringing, those sounds together. And I remember in the early 1990s, when I began to learn how. All of this has interrelated. I studied deeply in graduate school. The eating and the chewing, because I know I've shared with you guys in the past that children kind of freaked me out. So I focused on adult brain rehab. Right. And so if you had a stroke or a head injury and you had a swallowing disorder, that's called dysphagia. I was, in the hospital setting where I helped rehabilitate that process. And so it was the motor development and rehabilitation of it. Really made a lot of sense to me. But when I turned my focus onto the children, I thought everything I learned about brain injury and rehabilitation applies to the innocent little baby and toddlers who are just beginning to develop these skills. it's all interconnected, the eating and the talking. Oral motor mouth muscles, right? Develop over time and it plays a significant role on how your child forms the words and the sounds from Doing and badly link. I mentioned all the way through, co articulated conversational speech at three, and then really sophisticated language at five and six. But as I said, it was in the early 1990s when I really started to study speech sound development acquisition, and how that related to oral motor skills, which the truth is we are not. Necessarily taught all of this muscle, motor coordination kinds of stuff in graduate school, even to this day, it's kind of limited. So if you're interested as a speech language pathologist, you have to go out and find the other therapists and the other researchers, sometimes their occupational therapist, but I had to find. Someone that would help me do a deep dive, right. In one of my first mentors who still. Is probably the number one. in this study area is Sarah Johnson Rosenfeld, but she really helped begin to break down and study and, and provide training material as well as therapeutic tools and strategies and techniques because the graduate programs don't cover this. And there was a big, internal. Brew. Haha. And. political conflict between does oral motor skills really affect eating and chewing. And, we, as speech therapists need to be purest and blah, blah, blah, that's another whole ridiculous conversation. However, on that note, Sarah Johnson Rosenfeld really helped me open my eyes as well as occupational therapists. There was this huge practice there. And, the LA county area called, Rosemary Johnson and associates, and they were occupational therapists that really helped me understand sensory integration and oral motor development and how all of these pieces come together. But. I'm just going to share one little snapshot, for example. When your child or you and I, again, what we're teaching our babies and our toddlers and our preschools is what you and I do when we eat and chew. Right, but say food is kind of stuck between your teeth in your back back molars. It could be your lower molars or your upper molars, right. But we have to pull back our tongue. We call that retraction, pull back our tongue I always describe it to kids as kind of a Cobra snake. They, they pull back, they retract. And then you have to take the tip of the tongue and kind of brush it along your back molars, right. To clear off teeth. Or if you have. You know, say celery stuck back there or a piece of meat or a gummy God forbid, you know? Um, but, anything that stuck back there, but that motor skill to retract and then we call it lateralization to take the tip. And move it laterally, right? It turns sideways. And then to the other side, If you can do that motor pattern several times in a row, we usually counted 10, 20, 30, very similar to tooling. But if you can do that repetitively, then your tongue is mature enough. Developed enough. Coronated enough to be able to say the R sound and the R like in rabbit. Red. Road and that's one of the later developing speech sounds is one of the hardest to master an English. It's the trickiest because we can't really see inside our mouth, but Sarah Rosen felt Sarah Johnson Rosenfeld. Really identified. How, if you can master clearing off the back molars, then that's the same motor pattern you need to master the R and the R is the most frequently occurring sound in English language. It acts as a constant, like in red. Rock. It also acts as a vowel. Like in car. And, Butter. at the end, acts like a vowel and we can talk about the nitty gritties of the are, but it also acts as a blend like in T H R three. Or brown, right? So it has these multiple roles to play. It's very hard. Motor planning, right. To pull that tongue back and then to lateralize it side to side. But if you pause this podcast episode and just try to, Go back and say the are. You'll see how it is shaped like a Cobra's head. And it really takes a lot of finesse to it. That's why it's one of the later and more challenging sounds. For a lot of children. But I say this because if we teach our child. How to really bite and chew and clear food. You can also have to sometimes clear food out of the little pocket of your mouth, right? you don't want food to get stuck back there. You want them to always be safe. You'd want them to get up from the table and still have residual food in their mouth. That once they start running, they could choke on that. So you want to make sure all of these skills are in place and it starts at six months. It's really honed in by 12 by 18, there are fairly independent and pretty much eating anything and everything. And by too. They should have really good eating habits, but it takes time. And you mom, you dad, you grandma are in charge. Now let's move to the third major area of these four, then I'm outlining for you today. And that is. Chilling. Really helps build a healthy, strong facial development as well as nasal breathing. And you're like, well, it doesn't the face just kind of grow on its own and isn't nasal breathing. Just natural. Yes. And no. We have learned over the last 50 to a hundred years, but especially in the last, I'd say 20 to 30 years. How facial development. Needs to be shaped. And that we could do a deep dive. about this. But. I feel it's not talked about enough, especially in my field. But there are other specialists like occupational therapists, as well as orthodontics, as well as breathing specialists because this, this problem has become chronic. But chewing helps shape your baby's face. Literally. So when the jaw and lips and tongue developed properly through chewing and swallowing, It supports the facial structure, developing in a nice balance, symmetrical fashion. So proper chewing habits also encourage that nasal breathing. And I have talked a lot about nasal breathing here before. and we will do a deeper dive with some specialists in the future, but. It has his own host of benefits. So as I talked about the immunity. absorbing the nutrients and really starting the digestive Process in your mouth, through the salivary glands by chewing 20, 30, 40 times. But it also improves the energy level. It improves sleeping and even emotional regulation. So what happens in the mouth that affects your baby's face structure and development over time. Is that your honing their ability to have. Natural posture in the mouth. So the, teeth. Our slightly touching. And we say in our, in our world that you could slide a piece of paper between your back Mueller. So they're not clenched, but they're not open wide apart either. So the lips are touching very gently, but they're closed right there. That's telling you that they have a good seal. And they can say what we call the bilabial sounds right. The M my mama, the B Bubba, Bubba, and the P. Right, but they have good lip. Structure and strength and coordination. They at rest, they close. And they touch each other, the upper and lower lip. Right. And then the teeth in the back or the gums, if the molars aren't. Erupted yet. They're not barely touching you again. Visualize a piece of paper. Sliding through them. But the tongue then rests up ever so gently. Against the roof of the mouth that helps with so many things in the facial development. But it also helps support. Getting ready to swallow your own saliva or getting ready to take a bite and chew and getting ready to do speech At another time. We'll talk about the individual speech sounds right. There are 42 sounds that we use. We use up those 26 letters in the alphabet to make those 42 sounds in order to produce English. But the key here. Is that teaching good chewing habits early, really help. Build. The facial structures and then natural nasal breathing. It helps with that immunity, like I said, and if we are nasal breathers than. We're using the natural biology to filter the air, to warm the air, to increase our nitric oxide, a host of wonderful natural God-given. Elements to how we, as humans should grow. And breathe. And learn and attend and sleep. And it's all interrelated. But I started to do, uh, A real deep dive into all of this. I'd say about 15 years ago. And there are a couple of books that if, you know, you just want to peruse or get on audio, one of them was by a gentleman named. James Nestor, N E S T O R. And I'll have links down below, is called breath. And that's, looking at us as adults or your teenager, if they have a lot of chronic. auto-immune issues or breathing problems or sleep issues or energy problems. But he really peels back and did a deep dive into a lot of our kind of quote, unquote common or acceptable issues. Oh, you know, he's just a chronic snore. Well, he's four years old. He shouldn't be a chronic snore. Right. And then there were some other books that you might want to take a look at. One is called JAWS and it's by Kahn and Ehrlich, E H R L I C H. And, a lot of these books that I have recommended to you all to parents, to other colleagues of mine. I often take that 80 20 rule that I really look at it. And agree with 80%, there's always something that might be a little different or off, but that's how I look at this particular book jaws. the subtitle is the story of the hidden epidemic and it really does highlight how we've kind of. Through our, our modern lifestyle, our, our changes in our industrialized food. And a lot of our lifestyle choices have impacted how we grow. Structurally right. Our face. And then how we, build our energy, our learning capacity, all of those kinds of things. But it's fascinating research on. Really looking at how this is becoming epidemic that we don't really talk a lot about. And then there's another book that caught my eye years and years ago. Because of the catchy title it's called shut your mouth. And save your life. But it really talks about the dangers of mouth breathing and why nose or nasal breathing is preferred. And it does. It's research on the native American experience. And so that's another insight. There are actually probably dozens of books nowadays, really looking at this because. Sleep apnea or disrupted sleep is a quote unquote common problem. Across our lifespan. As I said, with babies and toddlers and school aged kids. it used to just be with the elderly and that's just not true anymore. And I think it's a lifestyle choice, but. You could set the stage and help them build the structure. Keep their nasal past wage. Nasal passage. Clear. And healthy and then really help build. a strong immunity. And all of these other wonderful areas, right? Speech and clarity, attention, focus, all of these things that I'm talking about today. So that was the, the third of these four major areas. And you can see how all of these things are interrelated. And, uh, One other note that I forgot to mention under this whole facial development structure. I think most of us. No, whether you're a parent or not that, babies have this soft spot on top of the head, they actually have two right ones on top. They're called FA. Fontan ELLs. And then one's on the back of the head too. And that just means that they're. The skull isn't completely fused because the brain is going to grow. And that leads into that myth that, you know, 80% or 90% of your baby's quote, unquote brain and intellect, and all of that is. Is done by the third birthday. It just means that your baby's head structure, the size of it, their circumference of it. Is 80% done. There's a whole host, a whole lifetime of learning. and shaping the brain and, and all of that. But somewhere between the second and third birthday, those fontenelles really began to fuse. But it's mostly designed to survive the birth canal. And then it gives that pliability. So the brain and the skull can grow together to about 80% of its full adult size by their third birthday. But on that note, We also have the capability of shaping the oral structure, right? The maxilla, which is your top jaw and your mandible, which is your lower jaw. And we do that through biting and chewing and swallowing. And we swallow about 2000 times a day. So not only just eating right, but those. Those swallows that we take with our own saliva. And we even swallow during the night. Of course. Right. Otherwise we choke on her own spit. But the idea is that every time you swallow, you put about five pounds of pressure. On the roof of your mouth. So if your a open mouth breather and you're pushing against your front maxilla, right? Where your front teeth grow and you're pushing forward. We call that at anterior thrust. Then you're shaping and you're, having that buck teeth. structure and you don't want that you want. Uh, wide. Kind of a lower Ridge palette, which is the hard bony part of the roof of your mouth, which acts as the floor. To your nasal cavity. Right? So if we want healthy growth and development, structurally and the immunity and all of that. Then the tongue has to rest at the roof of the mouth. All through the night as they continue to breathe and swallow their own saliva. Shaping. That nasal cavity. Cause the more air we take through our nasal passages. Then the more. The open those areas become and in the book, I referenced breath by James nester. He talks a lot about. Adults opening that nasal passage. And maybe you have heard about, Mouth taping. That's very popular these days. And if you haven't, you can just Google it. But there's odd. Wealth of information around this. But the point is you have a baby or a toddler, or maybe a preschooler that you can help turn this around. Help really build these very, very important skill habits that we kind of just take for granted. And I seriously doubt any pediatrician will talk about this with you. So my job, my responsibility is to share what I've learned. in the clinical practice, but also extra reading my own life experience and, regarding all of this facial development and nasal breathing. I screwed up big time with my daughter. She's now 24, but she was turned into a major thumb sucker. And I've shared this. With you before in previous episodes. And, we really kinda messed up her whole pallet shape. Right. It became high and narrow, like her thumb. And, crowding the teeth and whole. issue where then she required serious orthodontics in her teens. we can zone in on this, in and of itself, but this is a big piece. To setting them up is having good posture for breathing right during the day during playtime and listening time. And also sleep time, but it's also setting them up for good posture and readiness. For tackling all of those individual speech sounds and then blending those speech sounds together. So then they can be clear at three and four and five and hold a conversation and tell a story. Okay. So now the fourth and final major area that I want to touch upon. Is how the brain and self-regulate work together through healthy, chewing. In other words, how chewing really helps us build focus and attention. And we're all talking about that. These days, right? How do you help your little toddler and preschooler teenager, and even you and me? How do we help sustain our focus so we can complete a task or complete a reading assignment or focus and self-regulation, and what that means is really. Keeping your body still and your mind active to do something And it could be, practicing the piano. It could be, like I said, reading a book, it could be. building. A Lego set. All of those different self-regulations come from. the months and the years, 12 months, 24 months, 36 months of really building that biting, chewing and swallowing sequential pattern. Because that's helping to wire the brain. And so here's something cool. Think about it this way. Chewing as you know, by now, isn't just about eating. It actually impacts the firing in the brain development. So there's a bunch of different studies, but one that always kind of jumps in my forebrain. Um, is a study from Japan showing how chewing gum, how they actually used it with children and teenagers Actually stimulates the hippocampus, which then improves memory and brain function. And so the hippocampus area is where our memory is focused. And that's why, you've heard this before we chew on our pencils or our pen. We chew nails. We chew on our clothes. We, even, shake our leg, all of that kind of stimulation, where we're kind of pumping energy into our body to help us sustain. To help us focus to help us. Weed out the background distractions or no noise and then zone in on what, whatever we're doing. But this brain boost from chewing helps your child build. Cause that's what we're doing when they're babies and toddlers and preschoolers. And, you know, early elementary. We're continuing to build. Their attention skills, their ability to cooperate. And there's self-regulation. And like I've mentioned before self-regulation is really being able to. To have control over our feelings, our emotions, our body in space. So then we're not too reactive to whatever the external world is throwing at us. Right. And this helps. if they're playing and you say to them, okay, honey. In two minutes, we have to clean up. Because then we have to go to the store. Or we have to clean up and pick up your brother. Or we have to clean up. And then take a bath and go to bed. Any one of those transitions, but building this self-regulation this ability to attend and focus. And part of that is shifting. So if they're playing nicely by themselves and you interrupt them by your voice and say, okay, honey, in two minutes, we have to clean up. They can shift their attention to listening to you. And what they're doing, process it, understand it. And then recognize, oh, all right. Two minutes is no big deal. Right? I'll finish this little, do Hickey. And then we'll go on and I've had life experience enough to know. That mom means two minutes. And tomorrow I can come back to this wonderful play activity. So they have built even in there 18 months or 24 months or 30 months life experience. Enough attention and cooperation and focus that they really get the structure of the day. And it really does. Y your, their brain so they can process this information. Auditorily visually. Tactically they're processing taking in data. Interpreting it and then responding to it. Right. So it's such a natural way that you and I can help them build their focus ability and then become more independent and more cooperative. Like I said, But this is how God designed us. This is what I believe and, you know, good therapists and good science really validate what our intuition is, in how babies learn best and grow best and develop best. and to have realistic expectations of them. Yes. They're going to have meltdowns once in a while. Yes. They're going to have to. Step back and, and. And relearn something. That's true, but you can easily teach a 16, 18 20, 24 month old. How to transition. Through a lot of these life experiences. So chewing. And when they're little, they need a lot of chewing. Cause they're wiring that brain. They need a lot of chewing because they're learning through their mouth. Right. And so. We have to expose them to that. And, and that's part of my 10 tips, but. Trust me when I say that chewing is one of the body's most natural ways to self sooth. That's why pacifiers chewing on the thumb or, Chewing on their blankie or whatever really helps with self-soothing and regulation. And this helps them calm down and, And let's back up. It's not that we want them. To suck their thumb or two on their clothes when they're seven. We build them. We give them the opportunities in those first three years. So then. They are shaping the brain. They are making those neural connections. They are building a healthy sensory system, right. The five basic sensory systems, Sight, vision. Hearing. Touch and smell, but then we have those three hidden ones that I've talked about before. And one of them here, I mentioned the introceptive, getting in touch with our internal organs, all my stomach, just growled. I heard it and felt it or, oh, my bladder is full it's time to go to the toilet, those internal connections. And now we're helping them build when my tummy is full and I'm satisfied. Right or this food, this, this piece of steak tastes very different than this piece of salary over here. And I can differentiate. But you're building their knowledge base and literally building the neural connections. So those are the four major areas that really influence overall health and development and their wellbeing. And that's when I talk about wellbeing, I'm referring to their ability to focus and transition and listen, and follow through and cooperate and negotiate. Right? Part of that is no mom, I need more than two minutes. I need five minutes to finish this or 10 minutes. but they're able to negotiate with you through relatively calm. center of self. So now. Let's highlight, and I'm not going to necessarily dive deep into these, but I want you to think about, take these home because that's a way for you to start to evaluate in what I'm always sharing here with you, evaluate where you are. What are you doing now? How can you do it differently? Where are they? Are they on track? Are they a little bit behind, a little bit ahead? And what can you do to help them close those gaps when necessary? So here are some things that you can start to consider. As you're looking at your perhaps brand new six month old or eight month old or 18 month old or even 36 month old. Right. So the first is always start with oral exploration. Letting your baby explore safe objects with their mouse. We all know that that's why babies put things in their mouth. Right. We think about that. perhaps. When they're six months and eight months. But we have to really do it with intention. Give them safe objects as well as food, right. Different types. And we'll talk about that. So they can begin to really gather information, right? How does this feel? All it's tasteless. It's just a rattle. Right. But it's bumpy. Or it's hard or it's soft or I can bite and it responds and bite. And our response. So they're gathering data, right. Number two. Encourage biting and chewing with a variety of textures. And we want to do this through. Both safe oral toys, as well as food. And, lots of people will start with teething biscuits. I'm not necessarily a big fan of those any more I used to be, and we'll talk in a, in a future episode about, you know, what foods to pick and how best to set the stage to healthy eating. But highly processed foods, even baby organic, is still highly processed, but you can use it once in a while or in the very, very early stages, maybe in those first four to six weeks. Um, but also look at baby safe veggies in the beginning, you're going to steam them or roast them to make them aldente as well as fruits. Right? You can, poach. A pear or poach an apple take the skin off in the very, very beginning, but they're going to have different textures and of course, different tastes. number three. Lead by example. Slow down your own eating. I know this is hard to do, but I've encouraged you over and over again. He can really, really make a huge difference. Eat with them, slow down your own eating, chew visibly in front of your child so they can see the process. And I can't tell you, Probably 80, 85% of all of my clients over the years, they were stunned to learn that, oh, I have to show them. It isn't just automatic. No, we have a bite reflex. We have a swallow reflex. And we have a gag reflex and those reflexes are just. A quick, neat, literally knee jerk reaction right there wired in our system. If we have a good wiring system, right. Where. We're kind of developing appropriately, whether it's that bite reflects, you know, a half an hour after birth. Or a swallow reflex when they're finally getting the hang of nursing. Or a gag reflex where they just kind of cough. And a gag is healthy and you're going to see a lot of gagging going on. That's okay. That's very different than choking. we can talk about very specifics of how to identify the difference. Right? Choking is no sound. They're turning purple and is dangerous. Right. And everybody. Is always worried about that. Rightfully so, but gagging a little. A little coughing or even, spitting it back up. That's God's given reflux to help keep them protected and to help practice. Oh gosh, I didn't chew that enough. Oh, gosh, that was too big of a bite. Oh, gosh, I have to slow down. Oh, gosh, I can't talk and laugh and eat at the same time. Right. So those are things that you're going to teach them in real life. start with oral exploration. Use a variety of textures lead by example, number four, offer foods that naturally require more chewing. And this is a big one. and I've talked a lot about these ideas here in previous episodes. I had just about a year ago, October 17th and 24th back in 2023. And it was titled fussy babies and pacifiers. And I really dive deep into how to use a pacifier appropriately in those first. 6 8, 10 months. And then on October 31st of last year, 2023. I talk a lot about drooling and teething. And again, this is all about oral motor. Um, so you can go back and listen to those episodes, but in offering foods that naturally require more chewing. An apple. Right is different than a carrot, even right. That the flesh of an apple is going to be less crunchy, still going to crunch. Right. Then a carrot. And even different meat textures, right? You know, a piece of fish is going to be different than a piece of steak. And so you want a lot of variety and if they're only leaning toward a handful of foods, Then you're on the road of developing a picky eater and you want to move away from that. And I have a number of episodes about picky eating. And we'll continue to talk about that. But. Again, these 10 tips. Give you opportunity to step back and say, okay, where are we on this? And how can I modify our lifestyle? T to help build the skills and, and really create mastery. Number five use positive reinforcement. And what that means in this situation is that we have to share these eating. And, and dinner practices or, or eating periods together. Right. Celebrate. They're chewing with smiling and clapping and positive words and hip hip hooray, and high five and bumping and all of those make it. Enjoyable. Make it engageable. And I can't, you know, I started talking about this 20 years ago, how we as families. slowly but surely. Have moved away from eating. Meals together. And what I'm saying is if you want a healthy, strong eater, by the time they're three. Even by the time they're two, but. Then you have to take time to eat snacks and meals with them. You have to show them. It's not just table manners As I covered these four major areas, it's a plethora. Of critical elements to your child's health and wellbeing and growth and development. Plus it's fun. Sit down chat. Let them, be in their safe high chair and your, face to face, eye to eye with them, but use a lot of positive reinforcements and the number six. As I mentioned, create mealtime routines where chewing is the focus. So maybe have a chewing game even. And I used to do this in therapy all the time and model through my one-way mirror. In showing. Parents that you chew with them and you can count on your fingers. let's go back to my first comment here in this whole episode. I want to teach them how to chew every single bite, 30 to 40 times. And you're like, what, how do I do that? Show them. It will also help us as the grownups slow down, enjoy our meals. take in more nutrients. Really appreciate the different flavors. Right? All of this is, uh, is just family boosting. Think of it that way. Right. But you can count on your fingers. You know, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. And do that a couple of times and encourage them. Kids will follow you. I assure you. Number seven. Avoid over-relying on purees as your baby grows. And again, I have stepped back from this. I used to teach a lot of purees, but I don't anymore. Especially as baby led, weaning kind of exploded here in the U S maybe 10. 12 years ago. But. As I became much more. Focused on how do we build. How do we go back and help the baby transition and build these skills? Because in my private practice, I would get three, four, or five-year-old kids, six year old kids, sometimes who couldn't chew their food. They're mastication, right? Their ability to actually take even a bite of a sandwich and chew it properly. was really. Alarming to me. And. with a lot of us who were jumping into this oral motor. Feeding and speech connection. We had to figure out how do we help parents take on this role of teaching them? And at the same time, more and more and more packaged ultra processed foods were being introduced into our life. Oh, for the convenience. Oh, for the ease. And then the food companies got pretty clever, right? They want to make their money. Then they, did gluten-free organic. but it's still highly processed. Still predominantly sugar and sweetness. And, and it melts in your mouth. It does not require chewing. Just take goldfish, just put, pop a goldfish in your mouth. It will melt. And so we can talk about that. That as well and do a deep dive. But my point here is that when you start to introduce solid foods, you can use pureed foods. in the very, very beginning first, maybe couple of weeks, and I will use natural pureed foods. yogurt, for example is natural. You can eat yogurt any other way. Yes, you could mix, Fruit in there or nuts or whatever. I wouldn't do that with a baby or even a new eater of solid foods because that's two different textures and it's too confusing and they, they don't know how to handle it in their mouth. That's too. It is competitive data inside their mouth. So I wouldn't do that. You would have the pureed yogurt, right. And I would use Greek yogurt because it's high protein and it's also thicker. And then you would have fruit on the side in the beginning, but really, and I know a lot of parents and I've talked before and we'll, we'll go there and we'll continue to revisit this. Don't be afraid. Of gagging. Gagging is okay. As the natural God given reflex to protect them. Right. And so if you're sitting down with them, if you're sharing this meal with them, if you're modeling and showing them how to do it, they will follow you. And the less likely they are to gag, let alone choke. So we want to give them a lot of opportunities to work that jaw muscle, right. That up and down in the beginning, it's just going to be an up and down biting. And then over time. And we can talk about this later. There's what we call the rotary grind, Where we kind of rotate the jaw laterally from side to side, just enough to really what we call mastication. Right. Really to that food down. And when we, you know, count 30, 40 times, then they have a a lot of opportunity, a lot of repetition. It's like, you know, if you're lifting that barbell and you can lift a really, really heavy barbell for three to six reps, that's going to build bulk and sh power. Right. That's a different kind of workout. Then if you're really. Trying to wire your brain to communicate tow your muscle to move. And, and it's some, some therapists and some athletic trainers will look at that as priming. So you're going to do it 15 or 20 times in a really lightweight right. And that's what you're doing. When you're showing them how to chew 30 or 40 times. And then number eight. Give them time. Chewing is a skill that gets refined over time. Like I said, we're introducing. soft foods, chewable foods, tasty foods at six months. And then it's not until their second birthday where they're really pretty competent shoers. And can eat a wide variety of foods. Now it might be earlier than that. It depends on how much time you devote. but on the scheme of milestones and mastery, right? Full mastery is when 90% of the kids. Our competent. So be patient and be consistent. Look at carrots, you can start with, like I said, Steamed carrots Al dente day though. Don't make him smushy. Right. Um, but you know, the carrot, texture and density is different than salary, right. Even when you go to bite into it and they're both raw. There's still a different texture and density to a carrot and a salary. Which is different than cucumbers, which is different than a steak. Or crispy bacon. Or that sweet potato, right. Is doesn't have to be pureed where you put, cream and blend it all up, but it could be a chunk of a sweet potato, which requires some chewing. Right. And then that's different than say a roasted pear or a grilled pineapple. So a lot of different flavors, a lot of different textures, all of them required some kind of chewing. So, and that really leads into number nine, which is trying to offer foods that require different types of chewing ri so think of that as a stronger bite. Or, or a little less. Effort and, and just as your child builds what we call gradation, right? Grading going from step to step and making things smoother and automaticity. that gradation of grabbing something, A cup for drinking. It's not jerking. It's not all or nothing that they have that internal. part of the intraceptive system that, oh, this carrot is cooked. It's different than when it was raw. I can adjust. Or, gosh, this bacon is pretty chewy. I better to 10 extra times. it's is this kind of internal. Dialogue that your cells are talking to each other that you can just in nanoseconds. And then number 10. The tip or trick is to encourage plenty. And I talk about this all the time, but this is how this is all wrapped up and put on a bow encourage. Plenty of face-to-face interactions. And like I said, even playful biting and chewing games, right. Counting. Your number of twos or, biting down on a Cara and near her. Taking a deeper bite with it. Right. And really, you know, popping, but making it playful in the beginning. And then over time, the manners will come, but the manners can't come. You know, You want them to like a variety of food you want them to enjoy and eat in a, in a, you know, a reasonable time. You want them to sit there for 20 minutes and share a meal with the whole family in order to get there to those table manners. To chew with your lips closed. You have to give them these 10 Opportunities. Right. And so you're building that jaw. You're building the lip closure. Oh, the muscle's called an orbicularis Oris, It circles around your mouth. So you can round your lips for the Ooh sound. And then you can close your lips for the, what we call bi-layer Beals. Right? Bubba. Bubba, Bubba, Bubba. Right, but you also want to be able to sustain that lip closure. And then the tongue at rest, softly on the hard palate. So you can breathe through your nose while. You're eating. And again, kids who have chronic nasal congestion is, are often picky eaters. Because they can't breathe through their nose while they're chewing, and then they chew with their mouth open and it becomes messy. And it becomes exhausting. And anytime you and I've ever had say a head cold or a sinus infection, Eating is exhausting because we were not getting oxygen. We're not getting nitric oxide by breathing through our nose because we can't chew with our mouth closed. So again, I'm helping you connect the dots and interrelate these kinds of things. as a conclusion, I want to ask each and every one of you, mom, dad, grandparents, please. Do not underestimate the power of teaching your little ones, how to bite. And chew. And then of course, how to swallow. But it's a, win-win not only are you building healthy eating habits, which we talk a lot about here. And boosting their immune system, which go hand in hand, but you're also supporting speech and articulation skills, proper facial growth and development. And self-regulation, that's all interwoven. These skills don't come overnight. Please be patient with yourself and with them. But consistent opportunities with yourself and your little ones really. I can hone them over time, but you do have to demonstrate, you do have to show you have to lead. That's what you are. I believe. In God, our holy father and that he has given us these little precious babies. As gifts that and we're to steward them. We're to guide them through this process of growing and learning. through demonstration through some social reinforcement. And absolutely sharing family time together with meals, you can set this foundation. You can really get them going But you might be looking at yourself. I'm going, oh dear. He's 18 months or, oh, dear. She's 30 months. I haven't done a lot of this stuff. She's a picky eater. He's messy. All of this. That's okay. Just be honest with where you are and where they are. And as I say here a lot, you can evaluate, you can take data. Do I share meals with them, right? Where is his chewing at this point? What types of food and textures and tastes am I. Offering. Have I been a good role model? Can I up my game here? You know, what are our eating routines around meals and snacks? You can change all of that. And in the last episode, I think it was number 91. I talk a lot about setting up routines and daily structure, And you can always step back and say, okay, Well, let's clean this up. Let's reevaluate it sort of like looking in your messy closet and you say, okay, how do I. How do I purge this? How do I organize it? You take it all out. Yeah, keep what's important. Yeah. Throw away or give away. What's not what no longer serves you. And then you establish a new place, a new system in your closet, and that's what you can do around mealtimes. So no matter where you are on this continuum. Be open. To being honest and helpful and say, Hey, I got this. I can change this. So, thanks again for your time. I know it's precious. And we'll continue talking about healthy growth and development around speech and talking and play skills. And down in the show notes, I'll have the various links that you can Find the books that I referenced, find some chew toys that I really, really like. And also don't be shy if you have specific questions, email me. Or DM me. I love to help brainstorm and figure out what can you do differently to really close the gaps? All right, God bless. Take care. Bye.