This isn’t to say kids or people don’t bite after they grow out of this age bracket, but this is where it really begins. And for whatever unfathomable reasons, toddler teeth are as sharp as a velociraptor and that ish hurts. A lot. Still, I get why they do it. It’s basically the toddler equivalent of screaming into a pillow or punching a wall. It’s a way to get frustration or anger out. The drawback is that those two other acts only hurt the angry person doing them; biting doesn’t hurt the biter but the bitten. So, when the behavior is discovered, there is understandably a quick attempt to stop it. When I was a toddler teacher, I figured out quickly that the issue was that they just needed to go through the act of biting. This helped them to get whatever big emotion they were feeling out. After they did that they were fine. So, my go-to method was to have the parents of my biters bring in an old but still good teething ring for that. When I sensed a disturbance in the toddler force, I would ask whichever kiddo it was to go stand by their cubby to wait for their item to bite. And, for the remainder of the time I was in there, it worked out fine. Still, the end goal is just to stop it altogether or, if you’ll pardon the slight pun, nip the behavior in the bud. If your kiddo is a reader, or rather listener, then books may be one of your go-tos for stopping the behavior. And with that in mind, here are some books that are simultaneously fun and engaging while also being sure to emphasize why we don’t use our teeth in conflicts. I do want to give a real quick note first. Despite biting being a common issue among this age group, there is a noticeable lack of diverse books about the topic. This means that by extension, there is a noticeable lack of diversity in the authors writing about it, and this list is disproportionately by white authors. If you know of any more diverse books about biting for toddlers, please tell us on social media! Hopefully these books about biting for toddlers will help to give a bit of guidance to both you and the tiny biter in your life when it comes to curbing behavior. Most times, they do grow out of it. But, since you likely want to just get the behavior to stop, these books are a good jumping off point to try to start that preferred behavior. Find even more books for toddlers here!
