This comes up often, and in most cases it is a question of learning rather than refusal. Babies do not know how a cup works, and they need a lot of opportunities to figure it out.

Introduce it early

Tap water is fine from the age of 6 months, and it is worth introducing it right from when you start weaning.

The point of introducing it early is not hydration so much as familiarity. They need to learn what it is all about and how to use the cup.

Expect it to go badly at first

While they are learning, you will get lots of banging, tipping the water out and throwing the cup on the floor.

All of that is completely normal, and it sits alongside the other messy learning behaviours of weaning. It is not refusal, it is practice.

Try different cups

There are lots of really good speech and language therapists who have detailed advice on different cups and what to try, so it is worth looking into if you are stuck.

Going for different cups is often the simple answer. What one baby will not touch, another will use happily.

Open cups are worth trying. The water will go everywhere, but your baby may well prefer that to the alternatives.

Give lots of opportunities

Offer water around three times a day, so there is plenty of chance to practise.

Let your baby watch you drink, and show them how to use it. The same role modelling that works for food works here.

Water is not their only fluid

This is the reassuring part. If your baby is still having some breast milk or formula milk, they are getting fluid from that.

They also get fluid from food, particularly things like yoghurts, soups, and vegetables and fruits with a high water content.

So a baby who is not drinking much water is usually not as short on fluid as it appears.

Most babies self-regulate

As with food, most babies are pretty good at self regulating with water. They will take what they want.

Which means the approach is the same as with everything else in weaning: keep offering, keep it low pressure, and let them come to it.

Signs of dehydration

There are specific things to watch for:

• Infrequent wet nappies.
• Urine that is dark or smelly.

Either of those could indicate dehydration and would be worth getting looked at.

Short of those signs, I would not panic. But if you do think your baby is dehydrated, get help.

In hot weather

Breastfed babies may want more milk to drink in hot weather, and it is fine to feed on demand.

Formula fed babies can be offered a bit of extra water in between meals.

Water at mealtimes

Making water part of every meal is a good habit from the start of weaning. It supports the fibre in the diet doing its job, and it is one of the practical things that helps with constipation, which is very common when solids are introduced.