Repeat bites

[YourLivelyLemonHelper]

My 18mo daughter goes to a private UK nursery and she's been bitten by the same child 4 times in 2 weeks, and the last bite has left a mark which hasn't gone away after 5 days. The other child bites other kids too but my daughter gets bitten more often as she's very assertive and won't back down.
The nursery has agreed to put a plan in place to increase supervision and try solve the problem.
If this week nothing improves, could I ask the other child to be excluded till the problem is solved?? Apparently he does the same at home.
My worry is, firstly , her safety: bites are nasty if they break the skin and I don't want to get there. Secondly, I am afraid this will put her off going to nursery which is unfair given she's the victim here.
Any advice??

How do you know so much info on the biter, that it’s always the same child and that they do it to others? The nursery would never share that info.

Anyway, biting is a hard one. It happened to my child when they were about the same age as yours. Too little to tell me who done it, not big enough to fight back.

I don’t think for a second that they’ll exclude the other child. Biting is a normal development stage for lots of kids so their parents would undoubtedly go mad and/or the nursery would be wide open to legal action. It’ll be increased supervision, probably a 1-1 until this phase is over.

My sister's dd was bitten in nursery at the same age. She was well able to tell my sister who did it.

A nursery isn’t going to exclude a 2 year old for biting anymore than they’d exclude a 2 year old for having a tantrum or an accident- it’s all totally normal developmental behaviour.

Hi! That is absolutely horrific! Your poor daughter! I would definitely be up in arms with this and demand a meeting with the nursery manager. The fact it’s happened so many times means the staff clearly don’t have a plan to handle the situation and you need to do what’s best for your daughter as no one else is going to advocate for her! Definitely take it further and good luck!

it’s all totally normal developmental behaviour.
It may well be but if my toddler was on the receiving end of multiple bites from the same child I would want it dealt with.
The op's child has a right to be safe at nursery.

The nursery actually shared that info, i wouldn't know otherwise.... And my daughter hinted that it was a specific boy by pointing at him the bite and saying his name!
I find crazy that they'd let a kid hurt multiple peers each day, fail to prevent it and still allow him to go about his day. Don't they have duty of care?

Don't they have duty of care?

You would think so.
Ask for a meeting with the manager and don't be fobbed off.

And the nursery will be dealing with it I’m sure, but it IS developmentally normal and it’s a difficult stage but one that most children go through.

It’s not something they exclude a 2 year old for though!

And the nursery will be dealing with it I’m sure,

Only because the op has complained after her toddler has been bitten multiple times.

Biting is very hard to prevent as it can happen in an instant and the children will be on a 3:1 ratio at best.

I hope so! She's not been in this week so not sure about their plan

They should absolutely be more proactive when they have a known prolific biter

There isn't really a lot they can do apart from head them off though

They should be keeping a diary of what's happening immediately before the biting incidents to try to spot patterns and triggers, e.g., if the child is more prone to biting in the lead up to nap time and home time – i.e., when they're tired – or if they are struggling to share toys, or have become possessive of a particular toy. If they can spot a pattern, then they have a fighting chance of preventing incidents.

If they can't spot a pattern, it's incredibly hard – even if you have a member of staff shadowing the child, a bite only takes an instant. (Which is not to say they shouldn't be trying!) I really rate our nursery, but they still had a real problem with a biter in DD2's room at one point. It was just so random – the incident reports would be things like 'DD2 was looking out the window when another child walked over and bit her'. And then, as suddenly as it had started, the biting just stopped.

That said, if your child is a known target, can you ask that they be encouraged to play in different areas?

It is so hard my daughter was bitten and the bite mark lasted several months and it still hasn't faded. That child had bitten other children previously too. For your child to be bitten that many times in a short space of time by the same child is worrying. They should be taking it seriously.