Help! I Have a Biter! - Lincoln,NE

I had a biter/hitter combo - at 16 months they really don't know it is wrong. What they do see is they get attention (even negatvie) and they do not truly understand consequenses. or that because they bite they are being removed from play (it is about four years old for that development milestone to truly be acheived and even longer for them to think through their action to understand that if I do x than y will happen).
I have shared on the forum that my child care center director actually came to me and said, we do not kick children out - what does that accomplish - nothing.
Instead the director and a second teacher observed the classroom and noted what took place right before or during a bite/hit situation. after observing a week they came up with solutions to deter the situation before it occurred - hands busy with playdough, reading a book with my son in the lap instead of on the carpet, recognizing frustrating situations,e tc.
Also, it is unacceptable for punishment to occur in a child care setting - even time outs. I hate to be so harsh with this statement, but having seen what a true professional can do, I don't see that professionalism and knowledge here.
You may need to find a child care facility with more educated and knowledgable staff (look for folks who have CDA staff and administrator's credentials).
If all they know how to do is time outs, they are not effective instructors in my opinion.
Oh BTW - my biter/hitter curbed his actions within two weeks with the new approach and he is now almost 4 and we have no issues with his behavior AND we don't have to use time outs or threats:)
Hang in there!!

Hi There! I had the same question a few months ago for my daughter. A mom gave me a link to this article and it really helped me! www.bananasinc.org/uploads/1112818846.pdf

Before I read this I thought my daughter was just acting out for attention or was a mean child but this helped me understand more of what was going on.

The article that I attached has some great ideas to help keep your child from biting but from my experience, basically you have to wait it out. Once my daughter started talking more and she started teething less it got better. She still bites when she is mad sometimes but that is better then biting all the time for no reason and we can deal with that by time outs. When she bites my son because she is mad at him we put her in a time out and then we dote on him as much as possible and she hates it! She usually won't bite again that day.

Good luck!! Just remember...he is not doing it to be mean.

I went through this with my youngest child and I have a home daycare, it wasn't fun for anyone. Finally, another child bit him back and he never bit again. I didn't agree with the biting back, I don't see how that teaches them anything, but I have heard so many times that when the other child bites back, it works. Is that an option for you to try?

my son was the reciever of multiple bites from a biter at an in home daycare. The provider's son was the biter. She tried everything, shadowing, giving her son extra attention, giving my son all the attention after a bite, busy hands, etc. After the 10th or so bite, I called her in tears and said that if one more bite happened I would have to pull our son from her care. The next time her son chomped, she grabbed him and bit him - he immediately said, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" because he realized how much it hurt. He never bit again.