14 Month Old Biting Others

We've all been there. I can tell you for a fact that my son never bit anyone until he was biten by another kid at daycare. Then it took about a month for us to break that pattern. She probably learned this behavior because someone bit her once and she thinks it is ok to do. Keeping this in mind, I would not show her how it feels. Just consistantly tell her no and that it is not ok to bite. Kids do understand "NO" at that age. And as with any behavior change it can take anywhere from 20-35 days to stop the behavior so stick with it for a few weeks and she should get out of her phase fairly quickly. Best of luck to you.

Dear Lord DO NOT!!! BITE her back... She is at a critical stage in her life to learn trust, compassion, and empathy from others. ESPECIALLY the GROWN ups in her life. She needs to be able to trust them most of all to protect her and SHOW her the CORRECT behavior's of life. NOT to act like another one of the children she is dealing with on a daily basis. Your right in thinking that she probly is doing this with No harm nor fowl intended. And very often they do think of it as a kiss. I would suggest you speek with your provider,and get the particulars of the situation before becoming to concerned. Unfortunatly 14 mon. is a very typical age to start biting. And I alway say that Biting Looks bad, as well as hurt's . But somhow when little Jimmy hit's all day at Daycare it doesn't have the impact on parent's as a bite does!!!After you figure out the how's and the why's of your childs bite, I would the find a Key phrase to use EACH and EVERY time for consistancy. What I say Is In a STERN Voice!! NO BITE!!! Or uh uh Sternly followed by the NO Bite!! Children only hear the first few words you sat before thet tune you out. It is important to get your point across Quick.Then for this age of a child follow the statement up with a showing of the correct behavior you want. Like , We touch nicely, or WE Kiss nicely Etc. SHOW them the correct behavior's of life and it Works much better. If things progress fron there then you may need to change it up a bit and add statements like you HURT MY FRIEND!!! WE don't want to hurt our friend's we love them.... Typically biting happens for a couple main reasons innocent biting as you have said. or a SPACE issue . SPACE is HUGE for children thet are very protective of their space. Also SHARING is a HUGE one. All of these situations need to be HELPED by US the ADULTS in their lives... TO SHOW the CORRECT behavior's not yo repete the BAD ONE's Hope this helps you a little I alway's say biting and pottytraining are the two most difficult challenges of daycare. I have been a provider for 20 years and those two never get any easier. Just a Quick plug for your provider too, as well as providers everywhere This Friday is NATIONAL PROVIDERS DAY!!!! Alwaya May 9th the Friday befor Mothers day, as the therory goes that they should be your childs 2nd mother..It's widely publicised to us Providers but no one else, it doesn't make much sense to us, so spread the word for us if you can!!!!! THanks Providers are often thaught of as the sitter, and that should be the 13 year old on friday night. Your provider should help your child grow up to be ALL they can be in life the EARLY years set the stage for life.

HI S.,

I work with chldren and want to let you know this is a phase many kids go through. I encourage you to remove her from the situation and tell her "Its not okay to hurt your friends. Mouths are for talking and kissing, not biting." Keep her in a "time-out" for one minute (one year for every year of age is recommended); then remind her to use her mouth nicely.

Sometimes kids do this when they are frustrated, so you may want to watch what happens just before she bites. If you can anticipate she is going to bite, stop it before it happens and tell her, "I see you are frustrated that Molly is playing with the doll. You can have it when she is done. Let's play with the ball now." This stops the behavior, gives her a better solution so she knows she will have a chance and redirects her attention to something new. Labeling her feelings helps her understand what she is feeling. She is too young to understand everything you are saying, which is why the redirection part is so important. As you keep using this approach, she will learn how to share, how to use her words, how to label her feelings, and how to cope.

Use the same approach, but different words as she botes her daycare provider. "You are mad that its clean-up time. Its not okay to bite. Let's put the balls away." Reinforce when she does share. Praise her.

Please don't bite her or have her bite herself. This is not effective. She does not understand that her biting hurts and this is not the way to teach her. Biting her will teach her she cannot trust you and that you may hurt her. Ouch. She is most likely biting because she does not have the words/social skills to handle the situation any other way and biting is often effective. When she bites a child who has toy she wants, she bites, the other child drops the toy and she gets it. Not appropriate, but effective. By using the approach above, she learns the social skills.

Good luck!

Biting is pretty normal for her age. It's because they can't fully communicate with words yet and when they are frustrated, hungry, tired or just want some attention they bite. It will get better as she learns to talk and learns other ways to communicate. My 8-year-old was a biter at that age. Please don't bite her back. She's so little and that won't teach her that biting isn't o.k. At that age it's best to calmly say "no biting" and then distract her--redirect her to another activity. The stronger your reaction the more she is likely to do it again to get attention and get another reaction. Is it happening at a certain time or in certain situations? Maybe you can try to prevent it in the first place. If it's because she's tired or hungry change her nap or feeding schedule. Is it over certain toys at daycare? Since it started kind of suddenly is she feeling o.k.? Did she have a disagreement with one of the kids at daycare? One warning--the biting phase didn't last long at our house, but he did move on to hitting and we had to use some of the same tactics for that. We also had a rule as he got a little older that "when you hit, you sit." Good luck.

My mom's trick was to "let them see how it feels". Sometimes the only way we learn is to experience things ourselves. She bit me when I had the problem of biting other children... she said it worked like a charm. (Of course, she didn't draw blood or bruise me or anything... she just bit me hard enough to let me know that it didn't feel good.) She used this method with my other sisters and it also worked... the first or second time.

She actually doesn't understand that it hurts other people when she does this. She gets a "kick" out of the fact that they scream a little when she does it.

The only remedy is to bite her back while you are explaining to her not to bite. Let her bite you, and scream. Then bite her back (just hard enough to hurt) so that she can feel what happens when a person gets bit.

Then, as you wipe away her tears, explain that biting hurts and "we never bite anyone because it hurts them". Girls are intensely empathetic and a 14 month old understands English even though she may not speak it yet.

Biting and hitting both stop when children/babies know that what they are doing is actually hurting people.

This may sound mean but my Mom used pepper and it worked. The biting stopped immediately.Because of her age, you may just want to try to use something that she does not like (a taste like lemon) or something.
Just a thought--

I don't know if you want to use this advice, but here goes. Both of my children went through the biting phase. I bit them back and it stopped immediately. She is biting other kids, so if you are watching these other children in a safe environment, tell them to bite her back. Once she realizes and experiences the pain that she is inflicting, she should stop.

Good Luck

14 months old is not a time when kids can understand reasoning or put themselves "in another's shoes." She won't understand any explanation you give her, and she won't learn anything from being bitten except that Mommy hurts her. And the last thing you want to do is tell other kids it is okay to bite her!

She can and will follow consistant rules - "NO BITING!" said in a no-nonsense way and reinforced by separation from the situation immediately is the only way to go.

My daughter is two so not a lot of help except any Doc. I have talked to has said not to bite them back it confuses them. Just like spanking them for hitting. They learn by example. My daughter seems to do better for awhile then out of the blue something happens. A big thing is to watch for a patern in time of day or activity that may be going on so the provider is watching her more closely. My daughter does it when she gets tired and then frustrated she doesn't know how to deal with her anger. So you will have to work closely with your provider for a solution and Good Luck I know it is very frustrating because it isn't something you can just fix and you feel bad. My provider has told me most kids do bite at some stage so most of the other parents understand.

Good Luck