Toddler napping and nursery

[Pinkhats]

DS 17 months goes to nursery 2 days a week and the days he is there he barely sleeps, usually has 30-40 minutes. This leaves him absolutely shattered, really grumpy and I spend the next day getting him back on track. So 4 out of 7 days a week we have disturbed sleep.

He sleeps fine at home usually 1.5-2 hours at lunch time. They say he is being woken up by other children crying etc and once awake they can’t get back him to sleep. I did think it was a settling in thing and once he’d gotten used to it he’d sleep longer but it’s been 5 months now and there’s been no progress.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to handle this with nursery? I don’t know if there is more they could be doing to help or whether to just accept this is how it is. I really just feel sorry for my son as it’s making him so miserable on nursery days.

I think it’s a fact of life that they sleep less at nursery. I can’t imagine it’s easy to keep them asleep with so much else going on.

Where is the sleep space at nursery in relation to other awake children?

@JumpstartMondays when we looked around the nursery it was a separate room off the main room. However once he started they said they’d stopped using it due to staffing issues, so now it’s in the main room.

He’s still in the baby room which I don’t think helps as there is always a crying baby at any given point in the day

@Pinkhats then I'm not surprised baby isn't sleeping well at nursery, there's your issue.

Ask nursery when they might be able to resolve their staffing issues and resume using the sleep room? Or what they are putting/ have put in place to minimise the impact.

I think this is really child dependent. Mine stopped napping at nursery and then stopped at home too, he hasn't napped in 6 months or so now and he's nearly 3.

A friend's child will nap for 60 - 70 minutes at home but does 3 hours at nursery. She seems to sleep better in the noise.

When does he move up? Our toddlers room sends the not-napping babies through to the 3-year-old room, and the nappers sleep on the floor in the toddlers room, so there may be less disturbance. But then some of the toddlers snore and there's always going to be kids waking up at different times...