Children Biting in Daycare Home

I have an inhome day care and have been through this myself a few times. My daughter (2 yrs old) has bitten 4 times, but we were also moving from our house to a rent house for 2 months and then into our new home. Frustration can play a big part of why kids bite. If they don't get allot of sleep at night they are more cranky the next day and specialy at this age they don't understand how to share yet. If they see someone playing with a toy they had 10 mins ago they still think it is their toy. With my daughter, I make her go to the child that she has hurt, she has to tell that child that she is sorry and give them a hug. Then she has to sit in time out for a few mins while that child gets to play with the toys that caused the biting. I will always call the parents if it is a bleeding bite mark. One thing that I have learned to do is to tell them their child got hurt, but I am taking care of the situation and tell them how it happened and what I did to correct the children involved. If my daughter is awake when that child goes home, I will have my daughter tell the parent of the child she has hurt, that she is sorry and I make her tell them why she is sorry. Some parents specialy first time parents don't understand why children bite. Having my daughter say she is sorry allows me a chance to tell the parents that my daughter is not a mean child. Something just happened between the two kids that caused it. I've seen one of the boys that I take care of go up and take a book out of my daughters hand and take off with it. She went up to him to get it back, but he would not let go, so she leaned over and bit his hand. I wasn't sure how to dicipline the kids. I told my daughter that we do not bite our friends even if they take our toys. She said she was sorry and was sent to time out. After calming the little boy down, I had to tell him it's not nice to take things away from our friends. I felt bad for my daughter because she was in time out but he wasn't. I have started putting him in time out as he has gotten older.
A great tip for any kind of bruise, scratch, bite... rub some vasaleen on the mark. It helps the mark to not turn blue. It works great!

As a daycare provider myself....the biter becomes my very best friend and is with me constantly. I do NOT leave him/her unsupervised for one moment. Time-out is still used when it happens.

As the parent of a biter, I would expect the provider to consult with me about it and ask me how I'd like it handled. Ask them how they handle it at home. Even though they are teething, they have to be taught it is inappropriate behavior; otherwise, you'll have a houseful of biters very soon. Let them know how you intend to deal with the situation and be sure they are aware of everytime their child bites another. Compare notes and see if your biter is improving.

If it were MY OWN child in MY home, I would and did swipe their tongue with Ivory soap each time they bit another child. I only had to do this twice and the problem stopped. In fact, I used soap anytime my children used their mouth inappropriately. But, our child care standards do not allow us to do this to other people's children.

If my child were being bitten by another child....I would expect the provider to report it to me immediately and to be assured the problem will be nipped in the bud. If the problem persisted, I might be forced to make a choice to let the biter go. But, so far, I've never had to give a biter up. It's temporary and if handled properly, it doesn't happen more than a couple of times. You also, need to document this occurence on a calendar with a description as to how you handled the situation, for your own protection.

http://www.missBrenda.com

I agree with Brenda...she has some great advice. I used to work in a day care in college, and then I later taught school. Now I'm a mom, so my opinions are a little conflicting because I can see both sides. You could train the child like you would a puppy who bites. Now, I'm not advocating treating the child like a dog. I simply mean that when you catch the child biting, immediately give them a teether or something else to bite. Tell the child "That hurts. Bite this, not your friends."...or something like that. Good luck with which ever situation that you are in!!

Y. - Unfortunately, in biting, I think it is probably harder to deal with the parents than the children! I have been on both sides - biter, bitee, and my anxiety over it was calemd greatly by the way my daycare handles it. The most important thing to remind parents is that this is a normal stage. It needs to be dealt with, sure, but it is normal. My daycare keeps lots of great articles on biting and they hand them out to parents when these things occur. Those articles gave me alot of reassurance and some "professional" advice about it.

You sound like a very involved and concerend daycare provider, so I would bet that you are already dealing very well with the situation with the child....maybe finding some articles for the parents can help bridge the gap with the parents so you can really talk about it from a solution standpoint.

Good luck!

If one of my children were bitten, I would like to be made aware of it. I would expect that the provider would talk to the parent of the biter and offer suggestions of teething toys, biscuits, snacks, etc. If my child were biting, I would also like to be made aware of it. Children don't have huge attention spans and I agree that most children only bite out of frustration---they can understand, but can't speak yet---it must be very hard! So they bite. By reprimanding a child four hours later (or whenever the parent picks up), the child isn't necessarily going to know why they are being reprimanded. But as the provider, you can take them aside and discuss with them immediately how much it hurts our friends, etc. etc. I would explain to the parent of the child being bitten that you are handling it and what you are doing to try to curb it. Most parents who have read any type of parenting book, manual, whatever will know that biting is a stage that many children go through. If the biting gets bad, you would probably do better to lose the biter than customer after customer. Unfortunately, this doesn't help the biter, it will probably only make it worse b/c now they are more frustrated in a new environment, but you have to do what's best for the whole.