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Photo by thomasfam14
The toddler years are the perfect age to start teaching your kids manners and good habits.
CafeMom MrsManners aka: Angela Pitre, owner of the CM group Manners for the Modern Family and MannersMadeFun.com, is here to help.
Dear MrsManners:
My daughter is in daycare and has started biting other children. What should I do? I'm concerned that my daughter will be thrown out of the daycare.. -- Anonymous
From: MrsManners
If you find out your child is biting, it's best to be as proactive as possible. Start by talking to the preschool and asking them as many questions as you can. You are looking for clues because a child bites for many reasons, such as jealousy, frustration, anger, attention, stress, habit, trying to seek control, self protection, and so on. Your job is to try and figure out what triggers the biting so that you can begin to correct the behavior.
If you have done your research beforehand and I am sure all of you have, you know most daycare centers and preschools have a biting policy. Hopefully you know your center or school's policy, and you should work within the guidelines of that policy to prevent your child from getting expelled from the school.
Here is the real kicker, ladies. You are going to have to talk to your child. If you can get your child to talk about why he or she is biting, you may be able to solve the problem a lot faster. You can't do this by attacking the child though. You have to make sure that you have your temper in check and are ready to talk. Hopefully you are going into the situation armed with some fore knowledge from the caregivers about what was happening before the biting incident took place.
First, establish why your child bit. Then talk about other ways that he or she can handle the situation, such as, using their words. Remember to keep an open mind; you never know what may have driven your child to bite. If it was because the same child at school keeps taking the same toy away from her every single day and one day she just snapped, then you may need to talk about better ways to handle that. While she wasn't right to bite, she does need to know how to stand up for herself in an appropriate fashion.
If you are there when your child bites, swoop in and address it right away! Stay controlled with your voice but be stern — "No biting! Biting hurts people and we DO NOT hurt people!" It may be appropriate at this point in time to remove your child from the setting to give them a moment to calm down and possibly talk about what happened some more.
Ladies, preschoolers bite. It is an unfortunate but common issue. It is one that you need to deal with as swiftly as possible, and you may find that you need to get a little creative with the way you handle it. Because there are SO many possible scenarios, I would love to hear from some of my fellow CafeMoms about how you have handled biting. Don't forget by sharing your information and knowledge you may just be helping a fellow Mom who is at her wits end!
Don't forget to submit your manners/behavior questions in a comment on this post or via PM to Cafe Sheri!
- Is your child going through a biting stage? If you have gone through a biting stage, how did you handle it? What worked and what didn't work?
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Comments (8)
My DS is a biter....and we eventually figured it out that he does it for two reasons, #1 being attention, and #2....he felt the urge to bite down on something for a physical reason.
we tackled #1 by ignoring him when he bit somebody and giving the attention to the person who was bitten, watching for warning signs to prevent biting and... telling him that it hurts.
For #2 when he starts to try to bite for no apparent reason, we stop him and ask him if he would like to go get his biting toy (an old teething ring). He'll run to go get it, and chomp down until he is satisfied in a safe and appropriate setting.
Unfortunatly, after visiting my In-laws, a third type of biting has sprung up. They pretended to 'eat' his arm or leg in play and now he thinks that they were actually biting him, but biting doesn't hurt. So we have had to correct that as well....
Great strategies! You have handled these very well, sorry that your family inadvertantly added a third to your list though. Thank you for sharing with everyone.
I've very glad to see that you didn't include the "Bite your child back" method that so many women are so fond of.
After my daughter was born, my son would get angry and bite the couch. I'm at least glad we were able to address it at home, with inanimate objects, AND that the reason was incredibly obvious.
I have come across a number of Mothers who believe in the "Bite your Child Back" method and I would like to say that if you are one of those Mothers, Parenting experts suggest you DO NOT do this. You are in fact teaching your child that biting is OK by example, which is hopefully not what you are looking to accomplish.
Rana, thank you, I only have so much space to write and had hoped someone would bring this up so we could discuss it! Also, thanks for reading, it's nice to "see" you again!
Luckily, (even though the picture could show otherwise if she really did, bless my little peanut! lol), I never had a problem with my children biting on purpose. They have all gotten excited and hid their faces on my shoulder and bite my shirt and ended up biting me instead, but never had a behavior issue with it.
I can say however, that my mother took this picture and we didn't realize that she was doing that until the picture was looked at that evening...My son wasn't ever bit so I guess nothing happened...Thanks for adding my picture though!
at our daycare we have a few that bite, one that bites just to bite. no reason, he's just aggressive.
we use the approach of: giving the victim attention, helping the victim to say assertively to the biter: stop biting, that hurts! victim is tended to while someone else gets the biter. biter is told, extremely sternly: "We don't bite our friends. See his face? See how he is crying and sad? You made him sad by biting. If you want to bite you may bite (insert object here). You may not bite other people."
Then they go to time out.
Our daycare director said if we scold them and they don't cry they don't get it. so we have to be really harsh. i get upset with the biting, especially when it's repetitive from the same kid. and he doesn't bite his parents... because they bit him back.
the director also said if the kid finds the right kid and gets bit back that it might just help. but we can't tell the kids to bite back.... we just have to hope they will!
Wow so in your case the parents used the biting method, it worked in their home but it then left a horrible problem in the day care setting. You most certainly CAN NOT tell other children to bite in order to stop the problem. You are definitely handling it the best way you possibly can. I am deeply sorry that you have to experience this though, what a difficult spot you have been placed in. Not to mention the poor kids being bitten! Ouch!
we2angels, yikes!
MrsManners, nice to "see" you again as well. I'm flattered you remember my screenname. :)