Been told that DS 10mths is biting the ladies at nursery..

[aprilmeadow]

When my dh arrived at nursery this evening to pick up our 10mth ds he was told that he has started biting the ladies in his class. He does this to me when i am cuddling him, normally on my shoulder, or if he is on the floor it could be my knee or foot. I know he is only little, and when he does this i do tell him 'No biting' in a serious voice, but he looks at me as if to say 'ok, until next time'. What bothers me the most is that he has just moved up a group in nursery and i dont want him to be labelled as the biting child. He is a really loving, funny little monkey for all the rest of the time.

Also, he only seems to bite ladies. Me, my mum and these ladies at nursery, not my dh or any men.... Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to discipline/deal with this new habit..

Any help/suggestions would be gratefully received - apologies if there are other threads similar, i just didnt have to search the archives.

Maybe he likes the noise ladies make when they are bitten?

When he bites, a firm "No!" and put him down for a minute or so. The nursery should know what to do tbh. you can't stop him doing it there, I think you can't do much about it anyway. They grow out of it, IMO.

Were they telling dh in a "please do something about this" way, or just in a "this is something that happened today" way.

Not sure that anything can be done about this. A 10 month old is too young to be disciplined (other than reinforcing that it is not a nice thing to do by firmly saying no).

It's a phase and will pass. Try not to worry about it.

Agree, nothing you can do really at this age. Is he teething maybe and wants somethign to bite on? It will pass.

Yeah just say "no" firmly and put him away from you for a short while. I'm afraid it is just an unfortunate phase.

I think it was just to let us know that he is doing it, but i felt bad that they had to mention it.

He is teething, so perhaps that has something to do with it.

Thank you for your responses, being a first timer, you never know what is 'normal' behaviour and what isnt.

He did bite me this morning, so i said 'NO" and popped him on the floor - he did not like that. Hopefully he will get the message fairly quickly.

yes, april, you did exactly the right thing, my DS had a biting phase at about this age and I used to put him straight down and move away.

As others have said it is a phase and won't go on forever! And don't worry about the ladies at nursery - they know he's just a baby and that babies are like this! can you / would they let you provide teething toys for him to bite on?

Nurseries make a big fuss about biting - whether your child is the biter or the bitten. However, they don't seem to care nearly as much if your child is pushing/bring pushed, slapped etc. God knows why. To me, all aggressive behaviour should be nipped in the bud and biting is just one facet of it. I know it leaves a mark (some of the time) but is it really more serious than kicking or hitting? I don't think so and I wish the nurseries would lighten up about it. As far as I am concerned they are responsible for discipline while my ds is with them so they should be dealing with it. But they try to make you feel guilty for your child's behaviour - completely stupid.

Don't feel bad Aprilmeadow, DD used to bite too for a short while. I would never have described it as an act of aggression though, it was just something she did at random times. I figured she was just discovering what she could do with her mouth and teeth. I did the same as others and just used to put her down and walk away and she soon realised that biting meant mummy withdrew her attention.