Smacking, how to deal with it?

[mjbex]

Hi,I'm sorry if this gets a bit long winded. I care for an 17 month old boy who has started to smack the other children i care for pretty much all day long. His parents also say he has started to do it at home all the time and he bites them too. I asked last week how they dealt with it at home, so that i could do the same, so the child wasnt confused. They said they do it back. Obviously im not going to deal with it like that. At the moment i go down to his level and say v firmly to his face, "no, no smacking". It stops him for a while but then he just starts again. To be honest ive not come across this in a child this young before and i really dont know how to deal with it, Any advice anyone?

I have friends who dealth with their similarly aged child the same way as your mindees parents, biting, smacking or tweaking his face whenever he did it. I was to say the least, they thought my reaction was funny! It took them a LONG time to have any affect.

Mine, a similar age does odd bites and smacks (mostly to me). I use your method, very firm NO bite, NO smack, NO hit. I think you just have to carry on with this, and be right on top of him when he is about to do it to the other children, and removing him straight away which does mean a lot of supervision.

a firm no and removal of the situation asap

Agree with the other posters no firmly and remove asap and try to distract with something else, do you know why the child has started doing this, I've found with a couple of mindees that it often happens if they start a new playgroup or find a new friend and pick it up from them. I would try to get parents to do the same as you, one of mine said they used to bite them back oh how times have changed

I too would second the other posters views.

I have similar problem with one of my mindees and have done everything suggested but to no avail. I actually came on here to post about it! Will start another thread

Doing it back multiple times is likely teaching them that when you dont like what someone is doing and you want their behaviour to change you bite and hit them. Not a good for a start so you should tell the parents this, as i'm sure its not helping.

i also wouldn't use distraction if its happening routinely as then they learn fun things happen when i bite/hit/its acceptable.

Biting back is not so much to show them it hurts (they don't care it hurts others at the time and can see the reaction anyway) but its more a way to condition them with a horrid feeling immediately after they've done it. The same effect can be acheived by showing strong disaproval- say no, remove quickly far away, don't make eye contact, go immediately to child who was hurt and pay them lots of attention- pick up/cuddle/then play with them. After a minute or so go over to where 17month old has probably wandered off. Don't worry if they seem to have forgotten. Eye contact and explain 'you did this, it hurt, they cried, look tears/mark etc.', say sorry to victim e.g. stroke arm. (Everyone hugs and its all happy and good)

Also maybe 17 month old wants peer interaction so encourage them to pass toys/snack to each other, give cuddles, stroke hair, play hand holding games.

Take his hand immediately and show how to stroke the child gently instead - i.e. giving him an alternative way of getting the other child's attention and also showing that 'this is how we touch each other - geeently - because that feels nice, but hitting hurts!'. Repeat it over and over and encourage saying sorry/hug to resolve it. Remove him from the situation if he keeps doing it. He has no idea at this age why he hits or how it feels for the other child - he just needs to learn that it's not acceptable.

Ditto what 2to3 said - this method seems to work with my ds. There is also a book you can get on amazon called something like "hands are not for hitting" (not sure exactly - I have the "teeth are not for biting" one - although that is a little confusing since that is exactly what teeth are for!