Author’s practical guidance
Biting
Source named in the book: AAP · PCIT
Biting is usually a message rather than an attack: frustration with no words attached, teething, sensory overload, or the discovery that it produces an enormous reaction.
Say this now
“Biting hurts. Teeth are for food.”
Two short facts. Then stop talking and turn to the other child.
“You were so mad. Next time come and find me.”
Later, when calm. Gives the feeling somewhere else to go.
Do this
- Keep your response short, calm and boring.
- Give all the attention to the child who was bitten.
- Offer something safe to bite if it is sensory — a teether, a cold washcloth.
- Name the trigger out loud so they start to notice it: "You wanted to be first."
- Tell the daycare what you are doing so the response is the same in both places.
Avoid this
- "We don't bite!" delivered as a lecture — the lecture is the reward.
- Biting them back to show how it feels — it teaches the opposite of the lesson.
- Calling the child a biter, especially where they can hear it.
If it repeats
Track when it happens: tired, crowded, hungry, waiting? Most biting has one predictable setting. Change the setting rather than the child — and expect it to fade as language arrives.
Why the book suggests this
Biting is usually a message rather than an attack: frustration with no words attached, teething, sensory overload, or the discovery that it produces an enormous reaction. It is common up to about three, and it does end.
It also frightens adults more than almost anything else at this age, and that is exactly the problem. The size of the reaction is part of what keeps it going, so a calm response is genuinely harder here than anywhere else in this book.
From this collection
Same Words: Both Parents
45 prepared situations in this family area.