Nursery advice re biting child

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So I'll admit it: my 14m DD bit a child at nursery. She's also been bitten, but that's another story.

I asked one of the nursery workers, a nice lady in her 40s, what I should do about it, eg ignore, tell-off or whatever, and she told me I should bite back. Err... WTF?

She said one bite back and they won't do it again. I really, really hope she was joking, but I don't think she was.

Again, Wtf?! Aibu to be a bit concerned?

Disclaimer: nursery is lovely in every other way and DD very happy there.

It was a long, long time ago, but DB1 bit a little girl at a party: my mother bit him back and he never bit again - but that was standard advice at the time. In the same way, we were smacked as children, but didn't grow up violent ourselves. HOWEVER child-rearing has moved on somewhat these days, and by and large, any sort of violence to small people is frowned upon, for good reason (though I honestly challenge the "you'll teach them to be violent back" argument - at school, we went through a phase of assessing who had and hadn't been smacked as children: you could always tell, and not in a way that would support the idea it is detrimental) - and I think parents need to realise that accepted behaviour has moved on also. Two year olds aren't always noted for their receptiveness to reason - but at the same time, reinforcing that this is bad behaviour, however you would normally do that, is a perfectly appropriate way to handle this. (If you're normal method of reinforcing that something is bad behaviour is to bite your child, probably think again over your child-rearing methods!)

If someone bit ds back he wouldn't get the connection biting and being bitten. He would see it as someone who is supposed to be caring for him, hurting him.

I think it's pretty shitty advice for any age child personally but it's absolutely nutty to do it to a 14 month old! They're not going to get the connection at are they? I have a 14 month old and I don't think he's a particularly stupid example and he has nowhere near the level of understanding to think "oh yes, I was biting and now I know biting hurts and I don't want to hurt anyone". In fact he does bite me sometimes while breastfeeding- maybe I need to try biting his nipples? Although don't tempt me actually, my poor boobs :(

I feel for Splendide's boobs, but I don't actually think there's a single argument that sticks which justifies adult violence against a child.

Don't understand all this biting back without thinking nonsense. Are you all Hannibal Lecter?

I would report the worker for saying that.

Surely most of them who go through the bitey phase, do so at an age (below 3) when they don't have a well developed theory of mind, and aren't going to be making the connection between the hurt biting them and their bites hurting others?

Anyway like Dixie my kids (twins) bit each other and the pain of receiving a bite never seemed to deter them from biting next time.

At that age, no way absolutely! They are naturally mouthy and don't have the brain development to understand why it's bad or why they might be getting punished.

I know it's an unpopular suggestion the majority of the time by any means, although with my four/five year old who was still the "biter" (amongst other things - conflict avoidance/defiant behavior by deliberately wetting, breaking things, hitting her brother etc) in nursery, it certainly worked, with a good conversation, her permission to show her what it felt like, then talking about why she didn't like it and trying to get her to make that connection between her pain and what happens to other people she bit.

That only after being at my absolute wits end, trying every other suggestion from every person involved in her care at the time - never got any sort of diagnosis, she remains tricky to handle at almost eight. I tried so hard not to have to go there, and no one professional would have suggested it.

Apparently she still has issues with becoming physical with other children, her father allows her to hit him any time with the rule that he is the only person she can do that to, and it seems to work. I disagree with both now I'm less stressed and more educated with what might be behaviourally wrong with her (I have Aspergers and her father has ADHD). It helps that she can write now, and we have a system of when she has those feelings she can't express out loud, she writes it down for me, which both calms her down by distraction, and allows me to see what's going on in her head.

But it's pretty hard to have a child hurting other children all the time and feeling as if you are to blame for that, being told by professionals that your parenting is to blame, having no real support beyond her teacher (we used good behaviour charts and a behaviour communication book, so I could tell her what she'd been like overnight, and see what she was doing at school). I had to send her brother to live with his dad because he was suffering for it at home. I used to wish she would just hurt me, because at least then no one else would think she was a nasty person or that I was such a shit mother.