Mad terrier (and kids)

I have a nuts Parsons Jack Russell that has me somewhat lost when it comes
to kids.

We went through a really bad phase where particularly little girls of a
certain age (4 to 6?) used to run up and grab him when walking round the
park- 'Oh look what a cute dog' sort of thing, and understandably, he got a
bit snappy.
So I always used to avoid any such situations.

Since then, he has gotten older (like the rest of us) and his body clock
seems to have gone into overdrive- and he seems to sort of love kids big
style now- in a weird way.

Rocky...

What were the ages of the dog when these events occurred?

You gave a pretty good scenario, but it would be helpful to know
the age of the dog, what other pets are in the home, how
experienced you are, his neutering status, and other dog stuff.

For example, a lodger was walking him through town, and he sort of went nuts
wanting to go back up the street. So lodger thought "fair enough son" and
wondered back up the street. (Yes I know it is wrong to let a dog lead a
walk, but this once...). Anyway, they overtook random bloke with a pram, and
the dog launched himself into the pram and liked the kid like mad! Kid
thought it was hilarious, dog was overjoyed. Father and lodger stood there,
father goes "I think your dog loves kids mate!".

Problem is though that since then a friend has come round twice with there 3
year old son. I have played the dog to death with a tennis ball, tried all
the distractionary techniques, but at the end of it he goes into 'nutter'
zone. He gets this silly almost dolphin smile that terriers get, the
agitated panting thing that dogs do when in stress, and starts playing
REALLY aggressively- leaping in the air and ankle-biting the kid. This is
obviously SO not a territory you can get into- I refuse to let any dog of
mine bite a child- but what do you do.
Exclusion is the only option- but a 5 minute cool off period then a 'let
back into the pack' yields no results- same hyper activity.
I would try the food gambit (I.e. a plate of food that we all eat from then
pass to the dog)- but we haven't had enough calm even to try that.

The sad thing is that I think that he would really like kids- but how to
moderate his actions enough to allow 'interaction' is beyond me!

Any ideas bar the usual net nutters flaming spout most gratefully received.

Cheers, Jon.