Nursery letting 2 year old nap

[Rujj]

My 2.5 year old goes to nursery through the week. At weekends he does not nap and his bedtime is 7-730 and he generally sleeps quite quickly. On nursery days he often stays awake till past 9pm. He's then shattered in the morning.

They are clearly having him nap although they keep denying it. They occasionally admit it but not as often as this is happening. It's happened again today even though he was well rested this morning and had slept a full night. He's still awake now at 930.

The house is miserable. Adults getting zero unwinding time at the end of the day feeling frustrated and exhausted (other kid wakes early). He is exhausted all through the week, recovers at the weekend then the cycle starts again.

We're at our wits end. Have said so so many times to nursery that he shouldn't nap and it absolutely ruins his sleep and is not good for him (or anyone else!) They say he has not napped but it is clear he has. What do we do? Do we have to change nurseries over this? He is fairly well settled but honestly this is making life miserable for us all. Would another nursery even listen?

When your overtired you go past the point of being tired making it harder to settle and sleep, there is alot more activity going on in nursery than at home so that's why it doesn't effect him off a weekend.

I wouldn't assume they are lying, he might be overtired and over stimulated. There is a lot more going on at nursery than at home.

Over stimulated babies have disturbed sleep. The nursery setting is incredibly stimulating, especially if he’s not getting any quiet time to nap. If he needs a nap he needs a nap. Or nursery isn’t the right setting for him.

He may not be napping. He is peak development stage and is quite possibly scaling up to a big milestone. It sounds like he is overstimulated or another option not enough fresh air and outside time.

The nursery generally dont have issues telling parents they are not going to prevent a child from napping, no professional would do that .

At that age my daughter needed to nap 2-3 times a week. If she went more than 3 days without a nap she was a challenge to get to sleep and it was often 60-90 minutes later than normal. If she went she napped she went to sleep about 45 minutes later.

On days she napped we started the bed time 15 minutes later did a jigsaw or an extra story so bed time routine was 10-15 minutes longer and accepted it might take 10 minutes longer to get her to sleep. If we tried to get her to sleep at her normal time it was 60-90 minutes later as she got frustrated by not being able to sleep /us trying to get her to sleep when not tired.

At 2y9m she dropped to 1-2 naps a week
At 3 she did 1 nap a week for a month
She is now 3.5 and has 1-2 naps a month

I love the idea that you think two parents at home can’t get a child to sleep. But 2 staff can just get a roomful (8 kids) down at nursery even when they are not tired at all.

Over tiered children run around bouncing off walls, repeatedly get up, they can be like hamsters on a wheel unable to stop they don't lay it sit down quietly ....it's like us after an exhausting day thinking we will sleep well and ending up awake for hours.

Lol....

Sleep deprivation is against the child's human rights it's listed as a basic need unless your suggesting drugs are used the child needed sleep. A member of staff has to be with a sleeping child.
You've never worked with multiple children I guess, a few asleep makes no difference

Nursery rooms and routines for 2+ years are not really set up to accommodate regular naps. If a child at our nursery falls asleep whilst playing we will let them sleep on a mat in the book corner, but we wouldn't be settling down wide awake children for a nap just to make our lives easier. If a child has fallen asleep whilst playing they are obviously tired and keeping them awake would be bordering on cruel.

Nursery rooms and routines for 2+ years are not really set up to accommodate regular naps.
I must be imagining the nursery my two went to having a nap area/quiet time for the over 2s then.

Oh we had this with our eldest who dropped naps before two. One particular staff member was convinced she should never wake her (we realised early on we needed to cap her nap) and it caused carnage with late nights and an exhausted toddler in the morning who hadn’t gone to bed till 9. When she was moved on the other staff happily agreed with us that she didn’t need the sleep at all!

Speak to management. It is possible he does need a little nap on nursery days as it is super stimulating, but if so at 2.5 it should just be a quick Power Nap. They also do sleep at nursery out of peer influence if lots around them are still sleeping, even if they don’t need it.

What sort of nursery does that though? Ours had sleeping rooms/space in room right up until the preschool room and any preschoolers who still needed a nap went to the room below for it.

The NHS suggests 10-13 hours sleep a day for 3-5 year olds which means many will still need to nap.

www.gosh.nhs.uk/conditions-and-treatments/procedures-and-treatments/sleep-hygiene-children/

Maybe private day nurseries have facilities for napping? The nurseries I have had experience of recently are the preschool, term time only type nurseries, often attached to primary schools. They take children from two. Whilst we have mats and blankets that we can put out in the book corner if children fall asleep or are unwell, we don't have an area for regular daily naps.

Those are very different though, they're more unusual (only one in my entire area!), they're for preschoolers and a few slightly younger children and they have much shorter days so less need for a nap.

Whereas private nursery is a lot longer day (ours offered 7am - 6.30pm), younger babies up to preschoolers and has more extensive facilities - ours had five "rooms" from six weeks old up until almost five years and four of those had sleeping areas or separate sleeping rooms.

This.

Nursery won't be forcing your child to nap. Children who don't want to nap are going to disturb the other sleepers, by their chatting, standing up, dancing or whatever. If there is a sleeproom full (or even only has one) sleeping baby/child, the staff are not going to be putting a wide awake child in there and risk the others waking up. So I guess your little one is showing obvious signs of tiredness, or there is no way they would let him nap.

Nursery rooms and routines for 2+ years are not really set up to accommodate regular naps.
Yes they are. My current nursery has 16ish 2-3 year olds in the toddler room and all but a few nap.

The nursery shouldn't lie, but the nursery has to do what's right for the child. The child comes first. If you can find a nursery willing to shout at your half asleep child or put cold flannels on them to keep them awake, go there.

I'd feel frustrated too OP and I'm in no way bashing you but when I was a childminder I had a little boy (2.5) who's mum said I couldn't let him sleep and he would literally just fall asleep anywhere mid afternoon - on the carpet playing, up the table colouring. It was a nightmare trying to keep him awake.

I hope they're not lying to you though. Being out of routine is the worst!

I feel your pain with this! Have a 2y3mo who is on the border with napping- she still gets tired if she doesn't have one but if she does bedtime is 9-9.30 too!
We have managed to stop them in the day when we are home, which works okay as long as she is asleep early and not up too early, she can just about stretch without getting in too much of a state.
But at her childminders she has been still napping (only for 45-60 mins) as we have left it up to her to play it by ear, but that means a really late bedtime, then a domino affect of needing a nap the next day to cope, so then another late bedtime, and it's then hard to break.
It seems she needs it there but can't keep having these late bedtimes....it keeps her sister up too who has school, so might have to cut it out every day unless she has had a really early start or wakeful night.

Such a balancing act!

Do you think staff don’t have things to do if the children are asleep?????

Nursery is exhausting though - children probably need to nap! Why can't you enjoy the extra time together in the evening? (Since you are apart all day). It's a short period of time.

If a 2 year old needs a nap in the early afternoon (and most do) then he should be allowed to nap. Simple as that. It may not be convenient for you but it won't be forever - he will grow out of it soon.

And half hour long naps don't work. It's just not long enough. You get the grumpiness of being woken up without the rest they needed.

They may not be lying. He may be over tired which is also keeping him up. I use to work in a nursery. Days are alot busier than at home so they all get more tired than usual. Also they can not be seen to be stopping a child who is falling asleep from sleeping at that age. It's important for there brain development etc still at that age and could be seen as not meeting the child's needs. They would get in trouble if Ofsted saw that! Also they have alot of kids to care for. Not just concentrating on keeping him awake when he's very obviously needing a nap bless him. Forcing a child of that age to stay awake isnt something they should be doing. Just thought it would be nice to give it from the settings view point too. It's hard work keeping everyone happy and doing the right thing in childcare settings! Please bare that in mind! :)