Any disciplining tricks for biters?

So my girls are generally really sweet & quite gentle - so far - except that my eldest has now started chomping on her sister, herself and me! She is definitely worse when teething (at the moment she has 2 new bottom teeth coming in, no molars as yet). She also bites when her sister steals a toy from her, &, strangley enough, when she gets really excited and affectionate. She will be giving her sister hugs & they will be tumbling about together, when all of a sudden she will start pinching, biting and giggling madly all the while.

I've tried distraction, & that doesn't work at all. I'm not really comfortable with hitting (my mother was a great one for hitting & all it taught me was that she had no control over her own temper). Removing the toy sometimes works, and placing her firmly away from whoever she has bitten sometimes works, but often she sees it as a game and giggles and tries to bite even more. Yesterday she bit my hand as I was moving her away from her sister. And it hurt! Her poor sister has a bunch of bruises from this behaviour. Anyone have any good ideas to "nip" this in the bud? (awful pun, sorry...) They are due to start a little toddler class in September & I really don't want to be the Mummy who gets all of the notes home telliing me that my little darliing has taken a chomp out of her classmates....

 

We went through this at that age as well. And mine was the one that bit when he was being lovey and affectionate. I honestly don't think they understand consequence at this age so for us it was more of saying ouch really loudly and saying be nice or gentle. Showing them what being nice is, like when they hug, say oh that's a nice hug.
For us it was a pretty quick phase but I hope you can get some better advice.

 

owen was our biter. we say "no bite!" and remove whatever body part is being bitten. we've occasionally played a bit with it where if he started to put his mouth near something we'd say "no bite!" and pull back. it became a repetitive game where he would learn the pattern by putting his mouth near something and we'd say "no bite" and he'd pull back. he learned that part of the "game" was to not bite and to anticipate that the object to be bitten would be removed and he would not be allowed to do it. he stopped biting and after a while the game lost its interest, too.

we also have taken books that show characters biting and enforced "no bite." like one of their favorite books is dr. seuss's "hop on pop." there's a page with characters biting each other and it says, "he me, he is after me. him jim, jim is after him." and "he" is a tiger biting one guy, and "jim" is biting the tiger in turn. so when we read that book we always pause and i point to the biting and say "no bite!" and now when we read the book owen points to the page himself and says "no bite."

 

I found that my son bit when he was teething and frustrated. DH and I always told him, "Ow, that hurts Mommy/Daddy/your sister! No bite!" I also would do TO's in another room for a minute when he bit. Knock on wood, he has not done it several months. I hope your DD gets through this phase fast!

 

A developmental pediatrician told us, at 15 months, our kids were NOT too young for a time out and this was a good discipline for boundries.

Our boys get 3 'warnings' before a time out for most things they're not supposed to do... like trying to pull down blinds after we say no, hitting the TV after we say no, (basically not listening when we say no. We don't do this all the time, but for things where they could get hurt or do damage). After that they get time-outs for 1-5 minutes.
Time-outs are really good for stopping the behaviour they got in time-out for ignoring 'no' for, at least for a day or to.

However, IF they bite or hit (which they do) they go IMMEDIATELY in time out.

IT still happens, but less than it did before.

 

My one was biting at 12 months. The time out thing is really up to you, kids development at different rates. Only YOU will know if they are at the stage to understand. Mine were slow so they didn't get the time out thing. I found I got to the point where I would notice when she would bite, during a quiet time in the corner. So I was able to catch her before many incidences. "no bite" was what we did.

Heather

 

Thanks everyone. We've been saying "no bite"but I really think it is just a matter of constantly reinforcing it. She has been getting better - I have been taking her firmly, sitting her down facing away from everyone & saying "NO BITE!". That seems to be working - it takes 2 or 3 times, but she seems to get it. I gave her a time out in her crib yesterday for biting her sister (just 30secs or so), & she hasn't even shown her teeth since. Hopfully this is the beginning of the end! Thanks again for all of the advice...

 

We are going through this as well. If he successfully bites we say firmly "no bite!" and put him in a pack n play for one minute. And we play with the 'victim'. Granted, he doesn't mind being in time out, but I'm not worried about that, I able to give the other positive attention.
If I see him about to bite, I get very enthusiastic and say "oh, Christopher is giving Ryan hugs" good job Christopher, and almost immediately the 'bite' becomes a hug. So we try to reinforce hugs whenever possible.
It's rough, I hope you find relief soon!
reb

 

I had come back to add: Today it feels like a war zone...probably because Ryan is sick and they are both teething and tired...but man! we are all bit up!!!!!!!!