[Lilathe]

One thing we found that works very well with hitting and like a dream on biting....

When the five year old hits someone, totally ignore the fact that she hit. (the whole family has to be in on this.) Everyone goes to the hurt child and hugs and kisses them, pats and loves on them etc. All of the attention is given to the hurt child and absolutely no attention to the child that did the hurting.

Within a couple of days the aggressive child will start coming to hug and pat on the hurt child. (hopefully developing empathy). Within one week the aggressiveness "should" start to diminish. I find it helpful to keep a chart just for myself, not that the aggressive child can see,( because that would be attention for inappropriate behavior.) I tried everything to stop a child from biting, then a day care provider told me to try this. After 9 months of biting, this stopped the behavior within 2 weeks.

It also depends on the severity of the aggression, if the other children are actually in danger of being hurt then the aggressive child would have to loose the priviledge of playing with the other children. Playing with others is a priviledge not a right. Sometimes the priviledge has to be earned through short term play periods with others.

"you can play with the other children for 15 minutes now. If you do not hurt anyone you can play for another 15 minutes after dinner" Gradually increasing the amount of time the child can spend with the other children if he/she shows they can keep themselves under control. The short time frames give the aggressive child a chance to be "successful" at play and be praised for not hitting or hurting another child.