2 yr old starting preschool with conflicting nap schedule

[Aefeth]

Hi Everyone,

My 2 year old son is supposed to be starting preschool in September, but due to a clerical mix-up, he is now enrolled in an afternoon session rather than a morning session.

One of the main issues I am anticipating is that he currently naps almost exactly during the same 2 hour period that the preschool meets (he always naps from 2-4 or 1-3).

Does anyone have any advice on changing a child's nap schedule to accommodate a school schedule? Like most children, he is a total nightmare when he doesn't get his sleep and I am afraid that if he is not well rested it probably doesn't even make sense for us to have him in preschool as he wouldn't get very much out of it and would likely be very difficult/disruptive.

It is an excellent school and one of the few that also has a pre-prep/prep school up to age 13, so my husband and I are reluctant to pull him all together (it would be wonderful to not have to jump through all the hoops in two years to get into such a great school).

We have tried reasoning with the school to hold up their offer for a morning position, but at this point that is not a realistic possibility.

Advice Anyone???

Thanks in advance!

Lots of parents want morning sessions for this reason.
ime, he will be fine all session & conk out in the car or buggy straight afterwards. Then he'll be up a bit later at night.

The day was going to come one day, when he would be up later in the evenings, may as well start planning for it now.

He actually is up pretty late already--usually until around 9-9:30PM, do you mean even later than that? Maybe that is part of our problem? I am not a sleep expert by any means but maybe if i put him down earlier (like 7) he would wake up earlier and then be ready for a nap before his session? Is this easy to change? We've never been super strict with a schedule or routine, we just let him get into his own rhythm and went with it-maybe more structure would help?

Do you think when they are overtired in the class it is harder for them to get anything out of it?

I think an earlier bedtime would be better for him. He will be so busy having a great time at nursery that he won't notice not hav

Having a nap! I mean.

When my DS was 2.5 he started staying up til 9 at night. We dropped the nap and then he was back to a 7pm bedtime. He was fine 80% of the time with no nap in the day, although if we were in the car for a period of time late afternoon he would drop off (and still does at almost 4!). I would put him to bed earlier, up earlier potentially (or maybe not- you'll have to see what happens) and no nap except for when he really really needs it. We made this change overnight and didn't really suffer any major negatives from it, although I did make sure he got some downtime during the day (so maybe an hour before nursery) reading, colouring, or even tv, just to make sure he got a bit of a relax instead of romping around the whole time like he normally does. We've never done afternoons sessions at pre-school but he has attended nursery all day since he was tiny and hasn't napped there since 2.5 and it really hasn't been a problem.

Nap time usually changes as kids are growing up. I agree many parents elect to enroll their kids in the morning session for this exact reason. Firstly you could try again to see if he gets the morning session. If not then some adjustments have to be made. But one thing I am sure of is that kids adjust very easily. It's we parents who say 'my kid is used to this and that' but kids don't have many issues about adapting. My views of course. It could be a problem initially. But things will fall in place once he gets used to the routine.

When he starts school you won't want him going to bed at 2100-2130 so with pre-school coming up its probably timely to look at it.
What time does he get up in the morning? If it's 8am or later I would start by getting him up 30 mins earlier, aiming to get him down for his nap 30 mins earlier also, at say 1230. Mine used to nap immediately after lunch. I would wake him up if he hadn't already woken at 1400, then hopefully he'll be tired enough to go to bed earlier, hopefully before 8pm. I would let this bed in for a week or so and then slowly make other changes until he has a sleep routine that works. Ultimately I guess you would want him going down for nap at 11am and up for 12pm to get to pre-school. I don't think you'll achieve this unless he gets up early at say 7am. I'd be aiming to bring bedtime closer to 7pm and be knocking time off the nap in the day to encourage him to sleep better at night

What time is his pre-school session? I would try letting him have a 45 minute nap immediately after pre-school and see how that affects bedtime.

Last September when my just 2 year old started nursery there was no way he could have done the afternoon session as he slept 2-3 hours in the afternoon. He is just starting to drop his nap now at just 3!

Thank you everyone for all of the helpful responses! Right now he's waking up around 8AM so I am going to try to wake him up a bit earlier to see if we can get him down for a nap earlier and then down for bed earlier in the evening. Fingers crossed!!!