Is ten hours sleep enough for a 6.5 year old?

[Sleepsleepohglorioussleep]

DS is 6.5, on average sleeps for about 10 hours a night. He always seems tired. We usually aim for 7.30 lights off time to sleep. He can often find it a bit tricky to get off to sleep, I’d say on average he takes 30 mins from lights out but can be an hour at worst. He tosses and turns, mutters to himself and seems to find it difficult to switch off. Once he’s off, he usually stays asleep until 7am or thereabouts. Probably doesn’t help that we’re not as strict as we should be about sugary food / screen time but we do try to avoid both for an hour before bed. But he can be the same even on those nights where he has no tv or sugary food at all. He also likes exciting books and obviously that can get him a bit wound up. Guess what I’m asking is whether it is unusual for a child his age to take that long to fall asleep or whether my expectations are unrealistic.

If he’s only actually sleeping for ten of those hours I’d try putting him to bed more like 8:30. If he’s more tired he might drop off faster. Sometimes tossing and turning keeps them awake longer in the end ( at the moment it’s an hour and a half) than just putting them to bed, say, an hour or 45 minutes later.

All children are different but I’d have thought ten hours at that age was on the shorter end. Ours slept 12 hours until at least 8 or 9.

It sounds like he's going to bed too early. DS7 is at hobbies until after 7.15pm (Karate and Beavers) DD4 doesn't get home from swimming lessons until 7.30pm one night, we also enjoy spending time with them on an evening so bedtime is usually 8.30-8.45pm but then they don't wake up until 7.30-8am so 10.5-11hrs sleep which we find fine for their ages.

My 6yo sleeps 12 hours. She has recently been playing for ten minutes after story time on her tablet (thanks santa) and her screen time is ridiculous (thanks dh) but once her timer goes off she puts it down and sleeps with her white noise.
Now my 8yo on the other hand has always struggled getting to sleep. She can take up to 3 hours some nights even when the timer for light out has gone off and then it's hell the next day. She only sleeps for about 10 hours on a good night.
She insists on having bedtime stories on Spotify playing all night quietly and likes it dark in her room this helps but it's not a sure thing.
I think it just entirely depends on the child.

No other advice im afraid as I'm sure others will put in. Eg diet, exercise, maybe too early off a bed time...
We've tried many variations and this is just how we all survive in our house.

I'd go for a later bed time.
My twins sleep 8-9 hours on a good night, which is on the lower end of 'normal' for 7 year old, but they never seem unusually tired.

He sleeps longer than my 6.5 year old sleeps - but mine doesn't seem tired. I think whether or not this is an issue depends on how much it does seem that he could benefit from more sleep in terms of wellbeing rather than just because it seems like he 'should' sleep more.

I guess I’m worried that a later bedtime won’t make a difference and he’ll still take that long to wind down! Guess it’s worth a try. I’m probably overthinking it. I sometimes take a while to drift off but I have a very busy mind - usually overthinking something or other 🤪

Does he still have to get up the same time to go to childcare in the holidays? If not, Easter could be a good time to 'experiment' with this? I would give it a good week or so of a later bedtime to see if he adjusts, not just a night or two.

@MoreDangerousThanAWomanScorned I often have to wake him up in the morning and believe me he does not want to wake! It can take 20 mins or so for me to cajole him awake and then we have a grumpy boy on our hands. But then other days he wakes up bright as a button but then by late afternoon I can tell he’s tired when he starts bickering with DSis and being a pain in the arse. Who bloody knows!

@MoreDangerousThanAWomanScorned no it’s probably worth a shot isn’t it? Like you say, a good time to experiment. He used to sleep like a dream as a baby/toddler/pre-schooler, it’s just since starting school he’s seemed to find it a bit trickier to fall asleep

I think it’s maybe not quite enough total sleep. Try the later bedtime over Easter holidays maybe.