What time would you expect a three and five-year-old to go to sleep?

[Cookserella]

I have three kids, aged 1, 3 and 5.

The one-year-old goes to bed at 7pm, very easy, straight to sleep by himself.

The other two are a total pain. They share a bedroom which possibly doesn't help, but we've decided we need a total reset on bedtimes as it's taking over our evening.

It occurred to me that they might actually not be going to bed at the correct time. What time would you expect a three-year-old and a five-year-old to be asleep?

My children are also 5, 3 and 1! Bathtime is 6.30, and we aim to have finished reading and turn the lights out by 7.30, but it’s often 7.45.

They all seem to have quite different sleep needs. Eldest actually needs the most sleep so he’s usually out before 8.00. Middle one is in the tricky phase of nap dropping so it can be 8.45 or later before she’s asleep if she’s had a nap at childcare. Baby is fed to sleep and tends to align with the eldest.

Middle child is also up before the others, at about 6.45. Eldest sleeps until about 7.30.

DD is 5, she goes to bed at 8:30, awake by 7/7:30am. A nice 11 hours, right in the middle of sleep requirements for her age range. We went through an awful time when she woke up at 5am which nearly sent me doolally and frankly, I’d rather spend my evenings with my amusing chatty child than get extra time sitting on the sofa next to DH silently doomscrolling.

Could you try bedtime 7pm, reading/quiet time 7.20 then lights off and audio book on?

This worked for my two, and tbh still does (the audio book, not the bedtime!) when they have to share a room on holiday etc - certainly minimises the dicking around even though they're much older! In fact when they share a room (which they don't notmally) I make sure to take an alexa with us so they csn listen to something on audible... it worked when they were little and works now!

When my kids were that ages about 8pm. We never did earlier bedtimes as we both worked in London and only got home about 7pm.

Before alexa we had cd player - favourites were winnie the poo, Mr gum and diary of a wimpy kid, Alex rider, asterisk.

More recently lord of the flies, school texts, animals of farthing wood, Harry Potter etc

My 5 y/o doesn't tend to sleep till maybe 8pm. Would yours understand that they get to stay up later than the 3 y/o if you do bath and teeth etc together and then the 5 y/o can go downstairs and quietly play if they go straight to bed afterwards?

My DC are 6 & 4 now but even when 5 & 3 they never fell asleep before 9pm (& up at 7am). It’s just how they are. Good luck with your DC!

Does the 3 year old seem tired during the day?
Asking as apparently anywhere between 10-12hrs is normal for a 3 yr old - https://thesleepcharity.org.uk/how-much-sleep-does-my-child-need/#:~:text=While%20there%20is%20no%20hard,around%20eight%20to%20nine%20hours.

Thanks everyone for your useful suggestions and comments - I am very grateful.

My DH was out this evening so I did bedtime solo and they were all fast asleep by 7.55 - a recent record. So it turns out that Daddy is the problem 😂

Mine are 6 and 3 and they go to sleep around 8.30 or 9, and wake up (by themselves - we don't wake them!) any time between 6 and 7. They generally seem to be getting enough sleep though.

We wouldnt be able to get them to bed by 7. Either DH or I are working until 5.30 or 6pm every day (we work alternate days) and it's important to us to have a family dinner and some family time in the evening. So we don't start the bedtime routine until 7.15/7.30. But even if we could, there's no way the kids would be tired by then. And they have at least a couple hours of outdoor play/ running around/ swimming/ wrestling etc every day. I think it's just their circadian rhythm. DH has never been able to fall asleep before about midnight or 1am and functions well on 5-6 hours of sleep a night. I think the kids will be similar when they grow up.

OP, do your kids seem tired in the day or like they actually need an earlier bedtime?

We’ve always aimed for an 8pm bedtime with my near 5 year old and 19 month old. We don’t get home from childcare till 6.15 4 days a week and anything earlier would be unmanageable. 5yo goes up for teeth at 7.30, then does his school reading and gets a story from us, lights out about 7.50. Normally he’s no bother at bedtime but I do think the heat, light and end of term vibes are making things difficult this week. We’ve had lots of in and out for the last few days and yesterday it was gone 9 when he was properly down for the night. This is really unusual though.

We insist he stays in bed till his clock says 7am but he is allowed his Yoto if he wakes early. Again, that’s proving trickier when his room is 28 degrees.

My nearly 2 and nearly 5 year olds go around 7pm, no later than half past unless we are doing something out of the ordinary. They are early risers though, any time from half 5 (on a bad day) but mostly 6 onwards. We have tried everything for a later wake but DD1 is just an early bird no matter what we do!

We start bedtime at 18.30 for our nearly 5yo. When she was 3 and had not long dropped her nap it was 17.30 - 18.00. Sometimes it is a bit later if we’re late home from nursery but never later than 21.15.

I do think her sleep needs are on the high end of normal though. She’s usually up 6.30 - 7.00.

What happens if parents don’t get home until 5:45?!

So many people don’t realise sleep needs boil down to the individual temperament of the child. 7-7 isn’t universal!

8pm. They sleep 11 hours consistently- need to be up around 7:30am for school

I have a 5yo and 3yo. Normally in bed by 715 and asleep by 740. While it is so hot, my 5yo bedroom gets hottest, they've been in bed since 730 but 5yo doesnt sleep until about 830-9 and 3yo doesnt sleep until about 8. But they just lie in their beds with their feet up the wall listening to calming music on their yoto players or 5yo reads themselves another story, not messing around.

@BeSunnyLemonSheep sounds like a good routine in your house. Would you be willing to share any detail on what you mean by “I wouldn’t put up with…”? What does that actually mean? Would you shout? Would you reason with them? Would you take away something as a punishment? Or would your children just be ready for bed and 7 and therefore not an issue?

It’s great that you don’t have this sort of issue to contend with but without any further helpful advice (which I would genuinely grateful hear) your comment comes across a little superior.

My children are 3 and 4.5 and they also share a bedroom. Bedtime is 7-7:30 for both but @Cookserella we are also finding it trickier recently - basically since the clocks changed and the evenings are lighter.

I’m putting it down to the light evenings and the heat, and I’m hoping it’s just a phase that will get better when autumn sets in.

For us, they will sometimes go down without too much bother, or sometimes they will be up and down for an hour or so. We are calm with them, no nonsense and no chats (“we can talk about that in the morning”, “I can’t answer your question now, it is night time”) and ushering them back to bed over and over again. It isn’t too bad, they’re not running amock, but it is not ideal!

They can both go a whole day without a nap usually but recently, I think the heat has knocked them out a bit more readily during the daytime and so they sleep in the car at unexpected times and this will impact their bedtime. So I try to plan that into our day if possible, being extra careful to try to allow shorter naps during the first half of the day if needed but to not wear them out too much in the afternoon.

What's their punishment / consequence for getting out of bed after they've been put to bed at 7:30pm?

Every child (and adult) is different, my 2 at that age were probably between 7pm-8pm. I was a childminder working until 6pm and their Dad was often at work until 6pm (then half hour drive home) so if they were in bed religiously at 7pm would barely have seen him. Work out what works for your family, do they wake refreshed or still tired? What is their daytime routine like, are they actually tired when you're trying to get them to bed, how long after evening meal is it (I couldn't go to bed within an hour of eating my main meal so why would I expect my kids to?) do you have a bedtime routine so they're aware that bedtime is coming soon? We were always a bit more flexible during school holidays but started working our way back to 'normal' the last couple of nights (often the last week if it was the long summer holiday)

At 5 my children would go upstairs for a bath at 7pm. Reading at 7.30pm with the hope of being asleep for 8pm.

Could you have your eldest 2 follow a similar routine to this one 1 year old is asleep?

If overtired, I've found that sleep takes longer in our house. I wonder if this is what they're struggling with?

My top tips, especially for the 5 year old would be to have an analogue clock and point the times out to them...

It's 7pm now, you've got until the big hand gets to the 4 (20 mins) to play (or watch tv or whatever) and then it's bath time.

10 more mins warning

Bath time.

And again 10 mins and out the bath.

Let's see who can. Put their pj's on and brush teeth first. You have until 7.20pm

Ok, its 10 to 8 so that's 10 more minutes of reading this book and then we need to... (for us it would be listening to lullabies - but this would only be if reading hadn't worked.

I do the same on the school run... so explain the time and where I'm expecting us to be in the morning routine.

I realise you may already do all of this, but I've found it help us lots.

Thanks. We do do this, and he knows that 7.30 is bedtime. I will keep reinforcing.

I don't think my daughter has ever been asleep before 9pm. Closer to 10ish most nights.

To answer a few question that’s been asked a few times: they don’t seem especially tired in the day. DS3 doesn’t nap, unless he was eg in a car at about 4pm and then there’s a real danger he’ll drop off, but as we don’t have a car that’s very rare!

I also really appreciate the comments about family set-ups being different. We have dinner around 5.30 as that’s when my husband gets home, and we like to eat as a family. So that’s pretty immovable. Then we have winding down time for a bit before bath and bed. It’s the ‘bed’ bit that seems to take forever.

What time does he wake up at the weekend? It's normal for kids to want to stay asleep on school days as they know the moment they get out of bed it's going to be endless adult directions (get up, get dressed, eat your breakfast, brush your teeth, hurry up, concentrate on your maths lesson...). It's avoidance rather than tiredness.

8:30 is a really normal time for kids that age to not be tired yet.