Biting 21 MO, nursery are being too soft, please help! Long....

[lemur]

My 21 MO, otherwise very caring, has recently started biting and scratching at nursery. It started at nursery, and I think that is where the issue lies, but we are getting the guilt trip from the staff. Please help!

When DD bites it is often unprovoked, usually smaller kids, and done in full view of the staff. They react by telling her not to, but then cuddling her . The nursery is in a bad phase, with a lot of agency staff and have recently moved buildings, and I think that DD is doing it for attention because she has become less secure about the staff and has realised that if she bites, every adult in the room reacts... one cuddles the victim, one gets the compress, one talks to her.

We are being told she is doing it because she is tired and we should pick her up earlier. We work FT... DD is tired, it is true, but that is not what is causing the biting, and we think nursery are opting out of taking responsiblity for dealing with it.

They did not tell us it was happening for two months... and we think they are basically not doing the obvious thing - telling her off and time outing her or ignoring her (safely etc).

It is not a blame thing, but she is there most of the week, so they are the only ones who can really rein it in. Instead they say that it is really difficult not to cuddle her and that DD should see the child psychotherapist. Is it just me or is this a bit like over reacting and under acting on their part?

All advice would be great as there is a mountain of working mother guilt at the moment!

Thank you.

poor you, my 2 year old bites and it is horrible.
The nursery are handling this all wrong.

When a child bites all the attention, bar a swift telling off, should be given to the injured party, that way the biter will learn that there is no good reward for the vampire -like behaviour!

By cuddling her the are showing her that if she bite she will get a hug! Crazy!

Someone suggested to me that I put a little vinegar into dd's mouth when she bites. I did this and it seemed to work until she grabbed the vinegar off me and started to drink it . I've abandoned that plan!
Good luck!

Totally normal, as you know. I am a nursery owner and we have had a couple of biters in our time. Ours grew out of it but needed to be 'shadowed' for quite a while.

Kittywise, thank you. I love the vinegar story, that is so funny! Hope your 2 YO stops the biting too some time.

Ask them to put all their 'advice' onto their headed notepaper with a staff signature at the bottom - tell them that you wish to see their response to your concerns in writing.

They will soon stop all this psychotherapist shite (for a 21 month old? FFS!) and start giving more attention when she doesn't bite and less when she does.

Biting is perfectly normal, just not acceptable. They are trying to pass the book, blaming you for something they should be tackling themselves. You cannot possibly influence a child of that age when you are not right there with her, and it is unkind of them to suggest that you, he parents, actually have any control over this situation.

Bubble99,
That is interesting, we have been told that it is "well outside normal behaviour". What is your policy when you have a "biter"? Do you do time out with them as well as shadowed? Our nursery have said that it is contrary to policy and mentioned Ofsted...I really want her to be time-outed, as I think that is the only thing that will be easy to do consistently enough that she gets the message, given the staff problems etc.

lemur, it is well within normal behaviour. She's still a baby!!

She's too young for time out, to be honest.

She will grow out of it as long as they stop rewarding her for it, and watch her more carefully. Punishing her will only stress her more and make her more likely to bite.

Insist they put all their claims and suggestions in writing, and watch the dust as the manager backpedals.

Colditz,
Thank you, that is a really good suggestion. I was vaguely thinking about writing a letter if the next "meeting" isn't a bit more useful.

It is difficult because they are a very loving place (the permanent staff that remain, that is), and that is why we chose the place, but they seem too gentle to respond effectively, which in the end, becomes a problem of its own when you have a boisterous rather than quiet child.

Depends how 'time out' is handled.

No. OFSTED would not be impressed with a punitive action - but time-out in the form of another activity (not cuddles and rewarding, obv) would do the trick.

If staff are working well and engaging children rather than 'firefighting' a biter should not have too many opportunities to bite.

Colditz, thank you. I would agree that time out is a bit too much for her, age wise, but she seems to understand gold stars and get excited by the prospect of them and can talk pretty well (sentences and tenses etc) so although her reason might not be up to her talking, I think she probably does get time out. Good point about the stressing her out though. I had not thought of that.

Outside play needs to be properly staffed, too.

We have an L-shaped garden and our staff know that every area of the garden needs to be watched during free-play. There should be no blind spots. If a biter bites inside the play houses then there is not much that the staff could have done to stop it but in general it is usually obvious when a situation is building up to a chomp.

Lemur at toddler group this morning I 'talked' with my (Just) 2 year old and she walked in there saying 'no bite' she held it together really well for a couple of hours until she was getting tired and then bit a little girl really hard on the hand, teeth marks and everything.

I once watched her go behind a child as if to embrace them from behind, she wrapped her arms around him and then opened her mouth as wide as she could , leaning towards his chubby cheek. The whole room stopped as I screamed out "Noooooooooooooooooo"!!

It was like watching Christopher Lee in action

Bubble99,
Thank you, you have raised two interesting points there which are very helpful. I will suggest the alternative activity thing, and I think the firefighting might be exactly what is going on at the nursery at the moment, which is sad because it was so brilliant.

How exactly is it difficult not to cuddle her? Surely its pretty obvious that cuddling a child after they've bitten is going to reinforce the behaviour?
Child pychologist is ridiculous over-reaction. As is telling you you need to pick up your dd earlier.

If timeout per se is against their policy (I would ask why), I would ask what their policy is for repeated behavioural issues (I can't bring myself to call biting in a 21 mth old a big behavioural problem). Could they remove and ignore her at least?

One friend of mine was told by her nursery that they didn't know how to come with her ds as they'd never had a biter before. Another mate who runs a nursery said that just proves that they couldn't be watching the kids hard enough

Kittywise, you poor thing, that is so horribly familiar!!! DD has this little fake loving face she puts on (she spent Christmas chomping on her defenceless cousins so I have seen her in action) just before she does something really vicious... others are taken in... and then the jaws close and the screaming starts...

Aghaghhhahhh. If only it was just funny...

kittywise.

When my DS3 was 11 months he started coming into work at the nursery with me. Well, not 'with' me, but YKWIM. On his second day he got chomped by a two year old. The two year old was/is a lovely little thing but she wanted to 'give DS3 a kiss' and then leapt in before anyone could stop her.

The staff were mortified and made the manager bring him into the kitchen ( I do the cooking) to tell me.

Luckily he was my third child so I was completely unfazed and just grabbed the Mr Bump cold pack.

funnypeculiar, thank you - I will ask about their repeated behavioural issues policy (am going to go in armed tomorrow and overwhelm them heee heee). Agree that child psychologist seems ridiculous, although if she observed DD in action, presumably she would notice staff reinforcing it, and be able to tell us what we already know, that cuddling is about as stupid as it gets...

lemur. Can you ask the nursery if any of the staff have had any 'behaviour management' training.

This course is a freebie offered by most council early years departments and they should have had staff attend. Unless they have no/few permanent staff, which sounds as though may be the case?

Good point. Insist on an NHS child psychology referral, then they can look stupid and also be told exactly how to deal with it.

child psychologists are nice, I found ds1's very pro-parent, very pro - child, and good at pointing out errors (that both I and preschool were making)

Thank you Kittywise, Bubble99, colditz and funnypeculiar for all the advice. Its really helpful and reassuring to know that it is all normal stuff and the nursery just need to get a grip.

Am off to bed now, much more guilt free than I would otherwise be, thank you very much.

I can't believe the slackness of your nursery Lemur, it's really not good enough. It sounds to me as if the staff are either very inexperienced or just plain ignorant and lazy.

I had several biters when I ran the baby room (3m-2yrs) in my last nursery, a couple were REALLY bad. I had a method for dealing with any undesired behaviour (biting, hitting, pushing etc..) in line with the nursery policy but adapted for the age of the children.

The 'offender' would be swiftly removed from the child they'd bitten, told "you do not bite" or something similar and put over the other side of the room away from everyone else but still under my watchful eye. LOTS of fuss was made of the 'victim' and none given to the 'offender' for a while, depending on the age of the biter. The biter would then be re-included with a re-affirming " you bit x, it's not nice to bite, poor x" etc...

The aim of this 'time out' (for want of a better discription) was not to 'punish' the child as at this age they are far to young to be responsible for their actions/emotions. It was just to give a clear message that this behaviour was not acceptable or tolerated. The biter was also then watched like a hawk for possible biting opportunities with attempts to bite dealt with by removing the biter and saying "NO" etc..

It is impossible to watch a child ALL the time and sometimes they will bite no matter how hard you try to prevent it but you have to try and you have to be consistant. My strategy was by no means foolproof but it did seem to help discourage unwanted behaviour.

They do grow out of it eventually, it's just horrid at the time but it is perfectly normal and the whole child phsycologist thing is a load of old rhubarb, just proves they're talking out of their arses I'm afraid!

Don't let them fob you off or make you feel inadequate, you're doing a great job as your dd's mum and clearly want the best for her. I hope you get a more positive response from the nursery in future.