To be really annoyed with nursery over this

[notaminorthing]

My two year old has mostly phased her nap out at home but still naps at nursery. This does mean a later bedtime but as long as she’s awake by 2. I’ve specifically asked before if she can be woken by 2.

However they keep not doing it and today she slept from 115 to twenty past three. It’s going to be around half nine by the time I get her down tonight. I have a reception aged child who I won’t be able to do homework or reading or anything with and even he is going to end up in bed later than ideal.

I have just stopped myself sending a really stroppy email and I’m going to ring in tomorrow but am I really being unreasonable in feeling a bit like I’ve lost trust? I’ve specifically asked and surely common sense should dictate that’s far too late a nap!

Is it worth just telling them not to let her nap?
”she was up until 9/10pm on Monday after her nap the other day, so can we have no more naps as she doesn’t nap at home anyway”
I’d be really annoyed too in your situation. But maybe, especially as she doesn’t nap at home it’s easier just to have the clear request as opposed to one that might get missed by certain staff members.
all the nurseries by me have a 9m+ wait list at the mo anyway, so changing her in protest will probably be more hassle

You definitely aren't U about the wake time. I remember those days, naps past 2pm and up all night. Sent a measured email so you have a paper trail.

Oh bugger off. Anyone who glibly says ‘parent them’ about a hyper two year old on a pitch black evening should be trapped in a room with a thousand two year olds and noisy toys and forced to stay there for eternity.

Oh my god I would be so pissed off too! That’s a ridiculously long nap for a child of that age and they were definitely just running with it for an easy life. I get it, it’s an insanely difficult and exhausting job they have to do, but still…

Our nursery always respected our request to wake our son up by X time, and even before it got to the stage where we had to cap the length of naps, they would message us if he was having an unusually long nap and would ask if we wanted them to wake him.

We looked around quite a few nurseries and all of them said that they would go with the parents’ requests on naps and timings.

I definitely wouldn’t complain or pull my child out of nursery over it, but I would
make your expectations clear and then decide what to do if they have a policy contrary to that.

Hope tonight isn’t too hellish for you.

My Reception child was never asleep before 9pm and always did her reading whilst tucked up ready for bed. So 7pm might have been too late for your DC but it isn’t for all.

My two year old phased out her nap pretty early. With even a 20 minute nap she won't sleep until 11pm or midnight at night and then will wake at 7am the next day as normal - just absolutely shattered, the poor thing.

Without a nap she sleeps 7pm-7am happily, so 12 hours a day. With any sort of nap in the day she will only get around 8 hours of sleep (be knackered) and also continually wake up overnight, so get even less sleep. Don't ask me why she won't sleep at all if she naps, but it's true. And she needs no nap to sleep properly. It annoyed me when nursery insisted on keeping her nap because she wouldn't sleep overnight and was then continually knackered. I actually think it's pretty cruel on the kids!

(Rant over)

It's fair enough to sound off about the nursery. It's not fair enough to ask a question and then when people give their time to answer you, engage with your problem, you tell them they're rude and pompous and just generally give everyone who dares to disagree short shift. It's ok to be pissed off. It's not ok to be rude.

I agree that the nursery were unreasonable re. the nap. You're now being unreasonable using personal attacks to vent your fury about the nursery being unreasonable. Two unreasonables don't make a reasonable.

Yup mine were like this. A five-minute car nap at lunch time was enough to make bedtime a fraught disaster.

To be fair, some toddlers are just more active than others. I know my 2 year old would make it very hard for me to do homework with another child in this scenario

I work in daycare and agree with you, OP - they should have woken your child at the requested time. Were there substitute staff present who didn't know about your request? Have also been on the other side of the fence, as the parent of the child who napped at daycare and is now bouncing off the walls at 11 pm. It is brutal!

I completely understand why you are so annoyed by this. Its really annoying. You've asked them to support you with something, they're being crap and not doing it and it's making your evenings more difficult. For me it wouldn't even be about the homework, it would be about the fact that I'd have a toddler up until half 9. You need some time to relax in the evening for your own health and sanity.

Good for you. Sleep bred sleep for mine as opposed to the regular night terrors from a nursery 3 months before lockdown happened (then i could wfh with her) that wouldn't let her nap. We've since been diagnosed adhd so may explain it. I was NEVER cruel to my child for letting her nap. My one couldn't tolerate being overtired

I would complain, sounds like one of the nursery workers got lazy if they are otherwise ok. 3.30 is way too late indeed.

But you need to work on doing things with your 2 year old around. It's ridiculuous to put everything on hold like that. And a 6.30 bedtime is unrealistic. You can't expect them to keep your toddler tired so you can put them to bed so incredibly early.

Toddlers can be occupied for 5 mins, cbeebies exists. I had a hell toddler, climbed everywhere and into everything. Still managed to get homework done.

I thought the EYFS guidance was that they weren't allowed to wake a sleeping child?

Not every child's evening sleep is impacted by a late nap. Mine still sleeps like normal as long as he's up by 4pm so it's not common sense. I don't think there's anything common sense about toddler sleep. Agents of chaos yhe little things.

I completely get your frustration but a few years ago a number of nurseries were given inadequate ratings by ofsted for waking sleeping children - it was deemed they were putting parents wishes above a child’s needs. They said that if a child was sleeping it meant they needed to sleep - and this is a basic biological need. Not many people agree with this because we know the impact on the child’s routines, but nurseries changed their policies to protect themselves.

Oh and I have to arrive 45 min early for school in the morning to do spellings, reading and homework in the car. My DD simply switches off after a day.at school......she is year 5......never underestimate the power of sleep, it won't be forever.

My not long turned 2 year old is similar - no naps at home but loved a nap at nursery which went on 12-3pm if they let her. It then messed the whole evening up. I found putting a request on the family app we have that any nap is to be capped to 1pm, regardless of how long she’s had, stopped the ‘miscommunication’. She’s now still in a great mood when picked up from nursery & has a snack before bath and bed 6/6.30pm. It works for us as we’ve an 11 year old as well who still needs 121 time with us without her little sister.

You’re not ridiculous, my 2 year old is exactly the same, it’s a nightmare! Although I find giving her her own “homework” slightly helps…

Do they have a routine at nursery? Eg ours in the baby room follow the baby’s cues, but when they go to the toddler room nap time is 12.30-2 and they all get woken up at 2. I’d just reiterate you’d like them to wake her at 2 and explain that it really messes the evening routine up when she sleeps too late.

I think under EYFS guidance the recommendation is that they don't wake a sleeping child. They can make noise, call their name, turn a light on, remove a blanket or something but they aren't supposed to physically wake a child up.

I suppose some nurseries may stick to this guidance more firmly than others though.

Definitely worth another chat with them to see where their lines are and even if they refuse to physically wake her, they may be willing to push it a bit harder.

Complain to the manager. The nurseries I have worked at have been very strict that all children must be up by 2.

I’m quite surprised they are letting her sleep.

I would say to them that she is missing out on key nursery activities and may miss out on reaching her next steps as they are keeping her asleep.

Mention other nurseries and what they do and ask them if they are using extended sleep times to avoid looking after the children.

Don’t really understand these shitty replies. Our nursery asks what time is the latest we’d like him to nap until and we’ve said 3pm (in fact we just reduced from 3.30pm) so they wake him at 3pm.

It's a difficult one for childcare providers because Ofsted will pull them up for waking children or preventing them from napping.

Ofsted would say that the child's right to rest trumps parents' requests so nurseries find themselves caught in the middle.