Word.ws English Dictionary

spoonfeed

spoonfeed is the alternative spelling of spoon-feed.

Meaning of spoon-feed

Verb

spoon-feed (third-person singular simple present spoon-feeds, present participle spoon-feeding, simple past and past participle spoon-fed)

  1. (intransitive) To help somebody (usually a baby or elder) to eat using a spoon; to feed using a spoon.
  2. (transitive) To overly pamper or indulge (someone), so that they do not (or because they failed to) act or think for themselves.
    • I can help you with your homework, but you must understand the concept, because I will not spoon-feed you.
  3. (transitive) To give (something) in an overly pampering way, so that the recipients do not (or because they failed to) act or think for themselves.
    • What do you mean "I don't know"? I'm practically spoon-feeding you the answer!
  4. (ambitransitive) To explain (something, to someone) in simple words; to explain (it, to them) in words of one syllable; to spell (it) out (for them).

Forms of spoonfeed

third-person singular presentspoonfeeds
present participlespoonfeeding
past participlespoonfed
pastspoonfed

Questions about spoonfeed

What is spoonfeed the alternative spelling of?
Spoonfeed is the alternative spelling of spoon-feed.

Words near spoonfeed in the dictionary

  1. spooney
  2. spooneyism
  3. spooneyness
  4. spooneys
  5. spoonfed
  6. spoonfeed
  7. spoonfeeding
  8. spoonfeeds
  9. spoonflower
  10. spoonflowers
  11. spoonful

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: spoonfeed (page history and authors); spoon-feed (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “spoonfeed.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/spoonfeed. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.