Tips for encouraging your toddler to sleep later

When you have a newborn, sleep can be a struggle.  This is something that many parents going into parenthood may have been warned about and are anticipating.  Yes, getting your baby to sleep and learning how to become a good sleeper can be a challenge in the early weeks and months.  Often though, we don’t anticipate the toddler sleep issues that can arise.  In my work with families of children up until age 6, I encounter many tired parents of toddlers.  Until they have reached out to me, many assumed that if they are having toddler sleep issues, these are things that won’t resolve until their child “grows out of it.”  This is absolutely not the case.  Toddlers are very capable of either learning how to become great sleepers or go back to being good sleepers.

One of the presenting problems that parents of toddlers come to me with is the challenge of “my toddler wakes up very early in the morning and thinks it is time to start the day.”  I would consider anything prior to 6 am as what is known as early rising.  Yes, I realize that many parents would like to sleep past 6 but if your toddler is waking at 6 or later and seems ready to party, seems well rested and isn’t crabby soon after waking up, it is likely that they are just a bit of an early bird, but it may be hard to shift that time much later.  It is possible, however, to teach them how to lay quietly and play independently after 6 until you are ready to get up yourself.  Let’s face it, the days are LONG when you have a toddler and a few more minutes of peace and quiet can really help.  I get it. 

Here are some things to work on if your toddler is waking prior to 6am:

Pay attention to how much sleep your child is getting during the day 

Most children still need a nap until at least 3 years old.  Some toddlers LOVE their nap and will start taking VERY long naps.  Not only can this start to push their bedtime back pretty late, but it can also mean that now your child needs less sleep at night.  I have also seen this cut into your child’s sleep in the early morning hours.  If your child is going much over the guidelines for total day sleep as listed below then it is likely that they are getting too much sleep during the day and, if possible, it may be helpful to trim their nap a bit so that this can help with the early wake up. 

It isn’t morning until you decide it is morning, within reason

What this means is that you, as the parent, decide when it is time to start the day.  However, look at your child’s total sleep totals and if the time you are asking them to sleep to is beyond that average by much then you may be setting unrealistic expectations.  What this means is that if you want your 2 year old to sleep to 7:30 or 8am but they are napping 1-3pm, going to bed at 8pm (at 2 years old there is about a 5 hour awake window between waking up from a nap and being ready to go to sleep at bedtime), sleeping much past 7am is going to mean that you are asking them to sleep more then the average that can be expected.  That being said, if you are going to work on reinforcing 7am as the morning, then you can’t get your child up, turn on lights and start the day before then.  One of the best ways to reinforce this is by using a behavior modification device.  Most often I will recommend that parents use the Hatch because it is very easy to use and even has a clock on it for when your child is old enough to read a clock.  An alternative to this is that you can put a smart light bulb in your child’s closet light and leave the door either open a crack or the color is probably visible from under the door.   These devices/lights aren’t magic.  They are tools you use to reinforce a concept:  It is not time to wake up until your light turns green.  I typically have parents set the light so that it is red for the sleeping time.  Red means stop and red is a good light color for sleep as it doesn’t block melatonin production.  It then switches to green at the wake up time.  Green means go.  It is important that you are not starting the day before either the light turns green based on your settings or you flip it to green remotely using the app on your phone.  Sometimes I will have parents first work on setting their child up for success by starting it with the time earlier and then gradually pushing it back later.  Letting your child get up and start the day before the light changes to green teaches them that they don’t actually have to follow it, and it becomes meaningless.

Hold off on food and screens until later

One of the biggest reinforcers of early rising is your child knowing that they are going to get to watch something as soon as they wake up.  This reinforces the wake up because watching screens early when your child is really still tired puts their brain back into a sleep like state and leads to them zoning out when they really should still be sleeping.  It teaches them that they can wake up very early and then zone out watching the screen again.  In addition, there is really nothing that is as enticing these days then the opportunity to watch something on a screen so children will wake up early just knowing that is something they get to do.  I get it.  It’s early, you are tired, you want to go back to sleep too so you hand your child an iPad so you can get in a few more snores yourself.  We’ve all done it before.  However, by just pushing the time later in the morning when your child gets to watch things—usually I say, not before breakfast, you can actually shift their wake up time later so EVERYONE is sleeping later.  Same thing with early morning snacks.  Not necessarily because those snacks are so enticing, but more because it teaches your child’s body to expect calories at that early morning hour, which can also encourage the early wake up.

Hope these tips help everyone get in a few more zzzz’s! 😴

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