DS bitten again at nursery

[CrazyCatMom]

Picked up DS (20m) from nursery yesterday and was presented with two accident forms to sign as he had been bitten twice by the same child (separate occasions, same day). One has barely left a mark, but the other has come up in a horrible purple bruise and I can see the individual teeth marks so it must have really hurt him.

The same happened about 6 weeks ago when he was bitten twice in the same day by the same child. No idea if it is the same child on both days iyswim but I have my suspicions.

I signed the forms and did let his key worker know that I wasn’t particularly happy he has been bitten on multiple occasions now (she seemed shocked I am annoyed my child has been hurt??!) but was polite and I know it is a phase lots of children go through.

Would I be unreasonable to phone and speak to nursery manager next week? DH has suggested waiting to see if it happens again but I think 4 bites is enough to be raising a concern, and tbh I would at least like a phone call if he is bitten in advance of pickup as I felt a bit blindsided by it on both occasions.

Absolutely not ok and I say that as the parent of a biter (many years ago). The nursery simply have to have a plan to keep the other children safe.

Definitely sounds like they need to be supervising the biter more closely, it does happen but if it's happening repeatedly they aren't watching the child properly.

@CrazyCatMom I think you can say something as it is happening on a regular basis and ask them what they intend to do to stop it happening. I will add its fairly common at that age. Even now my son (5) is in primary school and last week he was bitten by a girl. Another kid was bitten by a different kid. The school immediately rang the parents to tell them as at this age they are old enough to know better.

Watching 1 child all the time means 2 other children aren't getting any attention.

To stop a biter in an under 2s room you would literally need an adult sat between that child and any other child all the time.

Then what if there are 2 biters? You can't have two children with an adult each shadowing them and one other adult looking after 7 other children and doing all the activities, nappy changes, making bottles, feeding, getting children down for naps.

There was a biter when DD was at nursery - staff used to put her in a little walker for a while so she couldn't get close enough to munch the other babies. It's not malicious but the staff need to be on it.

Definitely can't put a baby in a walker anymore!

I'd phone the nursery manager and ask for a copy of their biting policy and ask how they are going to deal with this going forwards. And they should be providing you with a copy of the incident report that they need to fill out.

If it is the same child, then it's clearly an ongoing issue.