Change nursery over naps?

[MrsCremuel]

DS 2.5 goes to nursery twice a week. I’m on mat leave with newborn and we’ve kept him there. He is an early riser, between 5 and 6 whatever we do so he goes to sleep between 7.30 and 8 and has a 2hr nap from 11-1. His nursery have a policy of only putting them to sleep where they shown signs of tiredness. Which tends to be for him when he’s there around 12 and one. At home I actively managed naptime and put him down to sleep. They then let him sleep till three or four which completely ruins our evening and mucks up sleep for the next few days. On these days he doesn’t go to bed till between 9 and 10 and still wakes up 5/6.

Do I switch to half days, suck it up or find a new nursery? I’ve spoken to them they won’t change their methods.

Tbh I'd move nurseries if you can. Agreed you can't really specify what time they put him down for a nap but it's rubbish of them to refuse to wake a child from naps even when you've told them it's destroying bed time. It's absolutely for their own convenience.

My DC nursery will wake them from the age of 18 months onwards if you ask them to. But we did have a bit of a fight when DC1 dropped naps altogether at home, as they wanted him to continue napping at nursery (purely for staffing reasons as it turned out)

@Maryann1975

Some nurseries/childcare providers do take the view that sleep is a welfare issue and depriving tired children of sleep is detrimental

I’ve come across this opinion amongst Some early years staff. However I think it’s more about staff trying to get an easier life by having a couple of children having a longer nap. I think bed time would be disrupted for most 2.5 year olds if they were napping for 3 plus hours during the day.

Op, I’d be looking to either change your hours at this nursery So you can be more in control of naps or find a new childcare setting who will be a bit more understanding about the sleep issue. Tbh, I’d go with the latter as I wouldn’t want my child in a setting with lazy staff or where there weren’t enough staff.

Unless a particular child is a total nightmare when awake, I don't think having a couple of children nap longer makes anyone's life easier. If anything it is easier to have all children sleep and wake at the same time.

Just being devil's advocate here. DS used to sleep longer at childminder's than at home. TBH it was quite nice having that longer time with him in the evening. Although I do see you are on maternity leave so not the same as seeing toddler at the end of a working day.

find a new nursery?

Or a childminder.

I had issues with my DD being allowed to sleep late in the afternoon before she was 1. If she was allowed to sleep late at 2.5 then I would be screwed.

11 to 1 is a very odd nap time for a toddler they normally havd transitioned to afternoon naps not sleep through lunch. You did say 30 months not 2 and a half months didn't you?

@jannier is it? He’s been awake for 6 hours by 11 so starts to play up as he’s tired. If he sleeps any later he won’t go to bed. He needs to be up for around 6 hours for a smooth bedtime. Lunch at 1.30.

Tbh, I see their point. When mine was that age she was in an absolutely foul mood if woken prematurely. A blanket policy means they are not having to deal with that.

[quote MrsCremuel]@jannier is it? He’s been awake for 6 hours by 11 so starts to play up as he’s tired. If he sleeps any later he won’t go to bed. He needs to be up for around 6 hours for a smooth bedtime. Lunch at 1.30.[/quote]
Not at nursery though - lunch will be 11.45/12ish.

@MrsCremuel many young children wake at 5 am your probably better to work on this end of the day encouraging stay in bed until later moving iit 10 mins or so a week so he gets a more useful day 11 am naps are generally left behind at around 18 months if not sooner. With many children attending school nursery at 3 from 9.45 to 11.30 before home lunch. Nursery lunch is typically 11.30 at the earliest so your child in a toddler room would be missing the social and learning opportunities of eating with others.

@ThirdElephant

Tbh, I see their point. When mine was that age she was in an absolutely foul mood if woken prematurely. A blanket policy means they are not having to deal with that.

Maybe but the parents then deal with the fallout of their child having napped too late

@jannier we’ve tried getting him to stay in bed to no avail. Rewards, gro clock, changing naps etc. Nothing has worked. Regardless of what others do or what childcare hours dictate, he needs an early nap otherwise he is throwing mega tantrums.

I work with 2 year olds and would struggle to get a child to nap at 11
I could get a bed out and ask him to lie down on it but I couldn’t sit with him or turn the lights off or put calming music on because I would be tidying up for lunch, reading a story, singing nursery rhymes and washing hands, ready to sit down for 11.30 for lunch
By 12 though, lunch is normally finished and the sleepers can go through to the sleep room with a member of staff
I do have lots of nap refusers though, they have a real fear of missing out at that age
It’s easy to manage naps when you have one 2 year old. It’s not so easy when you have a whole room full

Maybe but the parents then deal with the fallout of their child having napped too late

Yep. I can see though, why a childcare setting would prefer to have the parents deal with the fallout of the late nap than the setting have to deal with the fallout of the early wake.

FWIW, OP, I've read that if you change to a later bedtime it takes up to two weeks for enough sleep pressure to build for that to translate to a later wake, but it does eventually happen.

We haven’t changed anything about his routine, at home it works great it’s purely nursery letting him sleep late. At nursery he usually goes down between 12 and 1 which is later than at home but fine - IF they’d wake him by 2.30. But they let him sleep till 3 or 4 and then he won’t sleep till 9.39 earliest.

The issue here is them letting him wake late, not when he falls asleep….but they won’t hear of it!

[quote MrsCremuel]@jannier we’ve tried getting him to stay in bed to no avail. Rewards, gro clock, changing naps etc. Nothing has worked. Regardless of what others do or what childcare hours dictate, he needs an early nap otherwise he is throwing mega tantrums.[/quote]
But loads awake at 5am they don't nap at 11am most will be awake until at least 12.30 or 1. Id move my nap time to after lunch and wake at 2 to 2.30 consistently then he will develop that routine which will carry over into nursery days. Then in time you notice they sleep later in the morning. It also means they can attend groups that are held mostly in mornings.

Their inflexibility would make me want to look for another nursery tbh. I've never asked for DS to be put down at a specific time as I know their routine is different to home but they've been happy to be guided by me in terms of limiting the length or not putting him down at all. Even if he was the only one in the toddler room not having a nap. DS has dropped his nap completely now but they were happy to go day by day as it was gradually phased out.

The two year olds that need naps go down about 12.45/1pm after lunch is over where I work. Not all children sleep so makes no difference if a child needs to be woken early from a staffing point of view. However there is a debate about sleeping and brain development in young children and whether a sleeping child should be woken. Our nursery will wake children after set times at parent preference but personally I hate doing it as feel mean and quite often the child then gets upset or grumpy because they weren’t ready to wake up.

An 11-1 nap wouldn’t work where I am unless a child falls asleep naturally then and can be laid down. It would be too busy for one person to sit out with one child. We have staff outside to offer free flow, staff inside doing activities and then lunch at 12.

Refusing to wake is weird and letting sleep till 4

He prob sleeps to then as tired as up so early

Then bed late

Up early

Cycle continues

I wake all charges and my own daughter when she napped at 3

Giving 4hrs to bedtime

What time does nursery finish?

I think your child is generally overtired .
At 2-3 he needs longer sleeping at night - 8 pm to 5 am is only 9 hours.
At his age he needs 11 to 14 hours including naps.
Could you move his bedtime to an earlier time - early morning waking is often caused by over-tiredness. Maybe move forward half an hour each night. Look at bedtime routine this will help.
Napping at 11 am is very early for a 2-3 year old and must interfere with activities and lunch time . I can see why nursery are not doing a nap at that time. But they are wrong not to wake him after an hour or two.
Some useful information here re sleep:
www.gosh.nhs.uk/conditions-and-treatments/procedures-and-treatments/sleep-hygiene-children/

So we have done an earlier bedtime but this is only achieved by having no nap or a very short nap. This has meant we can’t drive anywhere around 11/midday as he will fall asleep. He generally has to be awake for 6 hours min before he will go to sleep at night.

Not sure he fits the guidance really.

I would move nap at home. Lunch 12, nap 1pm. Wake by 2.30pm. Bedtime 8pm as usual

My 20 month old roughly does that. He’s always awake by 6am, and bed never before 8pm.
It’s 1.45pm here and dh has been trying to get Ds to nap since 1pm, he’s bouncing around cot with bundles of energy and was awake at 6.10am today.

@MrsCremuel

So we have done an earlier bedtime but this is only achieved by having no nap or a very short nap. This has meant we can’t drive anywhere around 11/midday as he will fall asleep. He generally has to be awake for 6 hours min before he will go to sleep at night.

Not sure he fits the guidance really.

Why would you drive around at lunch time as a routine thing? What's your bedtime routine like do you wait for him to crash or put him down awake? Many think hyperactivity is not being tiered rather than being overtired which is why I'm asking?

We don’t drive around lunchtime as a routine we come back from places around 11 and he will fall asleep. I’m not sure why this has become a debate about his schedule, it was about nursery not waking him up from naps and letting him sleep to 4.

Bedtime is bath, books and milk and he falls alseep between 10-30mins.

At the moment his sleep pattern is much more like a 12 to 18 month old. Id definitely be doing the early lunch and nap after and an earlier bed time. In a few weeks you should then see he's caught up on the lack of sleep and has shorter naps in the day.