Tips for Introducing a Young Child to Bedtime

Most toddlers do not have a bedtime, but they may have a certain span of time every night that they go to bed. Regardless if your young child as a toddler had a certain time of night that they always went to bed or not, introducing the concept of a bedtime to a young child may have a few bumps.

Children tend to look at bedtime as a meaning that the day's fun has ended, the idea of laying in their bed, even if it is only for 10 minutes, until they fall asleep seems like it will take forever. The idea of sleep for at least eight hours makes it seem like it will take an eternity before they will wake up and be able to play again. Plus bedtime means that their parents, and possibly older siblings, will still be awake and having fun and that just is unfair. For these reasons a young child may be resistant to a bedtime. There are however some things that you do to make bedtime happen smoothly.

During the day make sure that your child has plenty of exercise. If their body is tired at the end of the day they will be looking forward to the act of sleeping much more. Generally a 5 year old may take a nap, perhaps while they are in the car. At this age a nap has the potential of making it very hard for a child to both be tired at their bedtime and to be able to go to sleep easily at their bedtime. If you find that naps are causing your child to resist bedtime because they are not tired, consider encouraging your child not to nap or to take shorter naps.

Another thing that can make bedtime a smooth transition is to give your child a bit of warning that bedtime is nearing. For instance rather than saying, bedtime is in 15 minutes, a hour or so before your child will be brushing their teeth before bedtime let them know that. You will want to use a positive spin to the news though, "in an hour it will be time to brush your teeth before bed, but you still have lots of time to play tonight." This will give your child the chance to except that bedtime is nearing but focus on getting the game that they are playing finished.

Lastly establishing a routine leading up to bedtime can really help a child prepare for bed. If you do bath time before bed, you might say at the beginning of bath time that after their bath your child will brush their teeth, pick out a book and you will read it to them in bed. This allows them to enjoy bath time, know what is coming after it and look forward to hearing a story. At the beginning a new bedtime may be something that a child really dislikes but over time they will learn that before they know it they will be fast asleep and they will be playing the very next day.