Nap or No Nap??

Wow! Congrats on your beautiful family!!! I have 3 kiddos: ages 6, 3, and 1. What I've noticed (with my kids and others) is that at around age 3 they seem to have phases with nap-time (probably due to growth spurts?). What I do is instead of having 'nap-time', we have 'quiet-time'. This simple change of words helps like you wouldn't believe. This gives Mommy some time to relax, place an important phone call, or get whatever done that needs to be done. It also gives the kiddos time for themselves. Sometimes their brains are going non-stop that they need some winding-down time. My 6-year-old reads, my 3-year-old either lays down or plays quietly in her room, and of course my 1-year-old naps. I think by the time my 6-year-old was 4, she was pretty much done with nap-time (that's when we changed the name). Our rule is that you can play or read in their room, but no toys with noise as to not wake our 1-year-old. The idea is to have 'quiet-time' actually be quiet. Anyway, I hope this helps... Good luck!

1 mom found this helpful

Hi A..

First of all, she is taking too long of a nap. Naps should be one and a half to two hours long. My kids were 5 when they stopped taking naps. But every child is different. Try "quiet time" instead. She doesn't have to sleep, just lay quietly for awhile. She can even play in bed quietly. I hope this helps. Good luck.

My daughter did this same thing at the same age...while my son continued naps until age 6! LOL!

When it was obvious my daughter was out of the naptime, I told her she would just have to rest. Meaning, just lay in her bed, watch a movie/read a book.color, etc. She didn't have to go to sleep, but just quiet time/rest. Sometimes she'd sleep, sometimes not, but she did get a bit of rest.

Hope this helps.
T.,
http://www.wellnessiseasy.com

I worked at a kindergarten in GA for a year and the principal at that school preferred that the children did not take naps. Contact your local school and ask if the children take naps or not. Usually they are weaned off of naps after Christmas break in a lot of kindergartens.

A.,

Even K-5 has a time that the kids lay down for a nap. They must lay down and stay quiet. Some will take a nap and others will just be very quiet. Maybe try having your daughter take a quiet time where she will lay down and stay quiet for about an hour. Most of the time my son did fall asleep while waiting for his quiet hour to be up.

Good Luck,
L.

well, I only have one 2 1/2 yr old son. He used to wake up 7:30am, nap about 12-2 or 3pm, (took good long naps) and then bad by 7:30-8p...

NOW he gets up about 8am-ish, has stopped napping, and goes to bed 8pm-ish. He does get sleepy and I can tell he wants to nap, but it's around 4 or 5pm, and that's too late so I make him hold on till bed time.

Don't know if that helps, just my experience...

Hi A.,
My daughter kind of stopped napping around 3.5-
4 years, now that didn't stop me from letting her get some quiet time, but she wasn't napping. I think it's up to the child as each one is differnt and quiet time usually works pretty good. As they get older they may or may not need naps or long naps. It just kind of depends on them, their mood, how their day is going. Of course if you are like me, you welcome them but soon she won't be able to take naps in school anyway so at least she's getting used to that idea.

Most Kindergarten's have a nap time still, and several kids at that age are no longer sleeping, but they can rest quietly and read a book or something. Each child is different. But you can still have restricted time so that your littler ones can nap. (Or maybe even you????) Geo

Hey A.! wow lots of little ones running around in your home. It sounds like "nap times" are your only moments of relaxation or quiet. I'm with you on the naps. I think all little people should have a tight nap schedule if at all possible. I am sitting with a 3 yr old neice who turns 4 this month! She goes to nap directly after her lunch also. By 1:00 p.m. she is laying down, no television on, but with music for sleeping. I play at a very low volume some relaxation music for her. She loves it! By the middle of the second song she is knocked out completely! Grant it, she only sleeps for an hour now but it's an hour of tranquility for me. I can anything I want during that hour and beleive me I use it well. Sometimes I also lay down, sometimes I eat my own lunch without having to jump up for any reason; sometimes I read or iron. I do what I couldn't do while she was awake and full of questions while following me around the house! It's like being in heaven and I'm not talking about a difficult child. She is a doll but curious about everything and quite intelligent!

As for your 4 yr old, things do change once they go to preschool. I recall when I was teaching, the 4 yr olds no longer were required to nap. While at home the rules are "yours" to enforce. My suggestion to you is to insist that she lay down. EVen if she doesn't fall asleep, she must be quiet while laying down for no less than 1.5 hours. That's cutting in half her old nap schedule and plenty enough time for her body to recuperate some energy.

Play some quieting baby music or relaxation music for them while they rest. She may surprise you by falling asleep with the soothing sounds of the music. My little ones also enjoyed the rain sounds, crickets, etc when they slept. With my neice I use music because it works well with her personality.

Give it a chance to function for you. You'll be pleasantly surprised! Good Luck and May God Bless you and your lovely family.

sincerely,

denise maria
Queretaro, Mexico

I work at a school and our Pre-K teacher only lets them nap about 1 hour and then gets them. Before the year is over the nap time is almost gone. it is more of a sit at your desk and lay your head and rest for about 15 minutes. This is to prepare them for Kindergarten when they only rest a little bit or not at all depending on how the day is going. I would start to make you naps less time.

About this age, I switched to "quiet time". If you make big deal about her being old enough for "quiet time", she should quit fighting you about nap time. The ground rules are that she has to stay on her bed with a quiet activity (books, a doll, etc). Cannot get up for more toys, cannot come get you to ask "how much longer?" etc... If she can rest quietly on her bed for say 45min then I would let her get up to do another quiet activity (craft, puzzles) until the other chilren finish their nap. The kicker is - about half the time she will probably fall asleep anyway - those are the days that she really needs the rest. But you avoid the struggle.

My daughter is 2 1/2, and for a while now, she hardly ever takes a nap at home. At daycare, they say she usually naps about 45 mins to an hour. If she ever does nap at home, it's usually about the same amount of time. Still, she stays up late at night! I don't know how she gets by this way!! haha

At home, since she doesn't actually go to sleep for a nap, most of the time I can get her to relax & watch TV for a bit before she gets up to be active again. My daughter is in a toddler room, but I do know that her daycare has naptime for the preschool age kids (3-5yrs). I couldn't tell you if all of the kids sleep during this time or if some of them just have quiet time. I would imagine that some do just have quiet time, which I think is ok, it just depends on the child.

I hope that helps a little bit.

I'm soo impressed that you got your daughter to nap that much for that long. My oldest daughter was about 4 when she stopped napping so I assumed my youngest would be the same. No such luck. Shortly after my youngest turned three, she'd had it with naps. Of course I was very disappointed (by, by me-time) but I guess all kids are different in the amount of sleep they need.

Kids stop napping at different ages. I used to work at a daycare and we had a four year old that did not take his nap. As long as he was laying quietly while everybody else was sleeping, we were okay with it. Maybe you can try "quiet time" since she won't sleep. I do that with my son some days when I know he won't nap- like Sundays when our schedule is way off because of church, etc. I will put on a movie for him to watch and have him just lay down and watch it quietly. Some days he will still fall asleep to it- if he's tired enough- and others it's just nice to have that hour or so of down time...especially with a new baby!! My baby girl was born 9/24!!

Congrats on your little one and good luck with everything else!

It depends on your definition of a nap. :) My 5 1/2 year old daughter still rests in the afternoon for one hour, but she doesn't sleep. I think if you can fit it into your schedule, you can keep that rest time for a very long time. Growing up, I can still remember having quiet time in the afternoons. I realize now that it was for my mom as much as for me. :)

Of course my daughter does school at home, so we can do the schedule however you like, so you'll just have to see how it fits into your day. My daughter gets to listen to cds (music or stories) or read books during her rest time. That might make nap time more attractive to your daughter if you don't already do that.

Good luck,
M.

http://www.webmd.com/parenting/guide/how-much-sleep-do-ch...
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(babies)
http://www.babycenter.com/0_how-much-sleep-does-your-chil...
(preschooler)
http://parentcenter.babycenter.com/0_how-much-sleep-does-...
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http://kidshealth.org/parent/general/sleep/sleep.html
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http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/health_advice/facts/childrensl...
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I really need that time in the middle of the day to catch up on the messes and just sit down for a few minutes. It is MY TIME to make phone calls, set up appts., all those important things that need quiet time in your area so the person you are talking to can make sense of what you are saying and the call won't be interrupted a dozen times.

I am raising 3 out of 5 1/2 grand kids. I put the 4 11/12 old girl in Head Start at age 3 and the 21 month old and the 10 month old both go to a Mothers-Day-Out program 1 day a week. This is my "day off", I get to sew, craft, do errands like seeing what the stores have in my size. I don't get in that dept. very often you know....

To raise these kids I gave up my career in Developmental Disabilities, I often miss the grown up time and the back work it takes, such as planning IHP's and considering what IEP suggestions I can give the teachers so that we are on the same page, so to speak. I worked as a group home trainer, a house manager, I trained people how to accomp. the consumers goals and so many other jobs. I really miss the job sometimes.

I hope some of the links above will give you some good resources.

G

YOur child will be the key to the age that ius appropriate for her. My daughter was the key to when it was time for her to stop taking naps. When I started rejoicing when the preschool teacher told me she didn't nap that day, I knew it was time. Otherwise she'd be up late that night. Later I discovered she was a child with ADD and they seem to need less sleep. So naps were done away with before Kindergarten--especially if I wasnted her to be in bed by 8:30.

I have 4 children and all were different. My first child never took a nap past the age of 2 1/2. My youngest took a nap until he was about 4. I always wanted them to take a nap for ME so that I could get some space and rest. If your child is resisting, I wouldn't push it at this age. You can ask her to play quietly in her room for an hour or put on a movie/public TV for an hour and let her relax to that. Eventually, she will drop the nap because it will be hard for her to fall asleep at night if she's slept 2 1/2 hours during the day. Hope that helps.

Kids are all very different, but this is how it is at my home:

At around 4 or 5, they usually don't want to nap anymore.
I personally homeschool, so I MAKE ALL of them lie down for a short while every day and have "quiet time"... (Otherwise, I would go crazy!! : ) They can sleep or not sleep, but we all rest (well, except for me! haha!).

Sometimes, when they're kindergarten age or so, they will occasionally need a nap during heavy growth spurts--but other than that, my experience is they stop needing them daily at about 4.

The finaly word on this, I feel, is that you as a mother will know. When they genuinely just aren't tired, then, perhaps they can just rest for a bit with a book or colors and paper on the bed..?

Blessings,
H.

my son stopped at 2.5, and my daughter is almost 3 and is about to stop. most of my son's friends don't nap either (he is in pre k too), so i guess you are just lucky to have gotten this long out of her. but then, my son never, not even as a newborn took more than 2 naps a day, my daughter moved to two naps at around 3 months, then they both moved to one nap around one year old, which i thought was normal, but i hear is atypical. i read that four -6 year olds need 11 -12 total hours of sleep a day. if she is getting that much at night, she is probably fine.

My kids are seven, five, and two, and all three still have a rest/nap time in the afternoon. When my oldest started outgrowing it by either resisting the sleep or by staying awake too late at night, I started letting her do quiet activities. She is a proficient reader now, so a good book is all she needs for an hour of rest time. But, for younger children this could be a picture book, a few quiet toys in the bed, etc. The purpose is two-fold - their bodies need a little bit of downtime during the day, and as a SAHM mom and homeschooler, I need some time to decompress and refocus for the rest of the day. So, even when the sleeping stops, the rest time is still VERY helpful!

My children never were very good nappers. When they quit napping, I continued with a quiet time. I would have them pick two books and go to their beds for quiet time and set the timer for 30 minutes. Sometimes during the quiet time, they would fall asleep and sometimes they would just lie quietly and look at their books.

I know that you will miss the nap time, but your child might not need it anymore. The good thing about my children was that once they quit napping, their bedtime moved up 30 minutes to almost an hour. That was nice.

I'd say naps are starting to go away - resting time is still going to happen through pre-k. What will start happening now is for you to keep her on a strict/rigourous bedtime schedule, maybe 1/2 an hour earlier than before.
B.

I have 3 kids and my "baby" just turned 5. All of them continued to take naps right up until kindergarten (and even sometimes when they got home from school!!). My youngest has started having days when he just isn't tired, and my older two did the same thing. I have always told them that I don't require them to sleep, just to lay down and be quiet. They would still have to go to their rooms, but they could read or play quietly if they were not tired. Most of the time, they would end up falling asleep anyway. But even if they stayed awake, they had some "down time" to calm down and recover from their day and, perhaps more importantly, I got a small quiet time myself :<)

Hope this is helpful! Good luck and God bless.

We're going thru this with my daughter, starting at 3 1/2 she stopped napping so much. Finally I told her she could stay in her bed and look at books if she wasn't sleepy, she gets 3-4 naps most weeks, some weeks only 2 naps. You might spend 30 minutes with her one on one before nap time, with the new baby (congrats!) she may feel a bit neglected and want some extra time with mommy so she's keeping herself awake to get that mom time. Also, she should get rest time in Kindergarten so having a usual quiet time shouldn't be difficult for her when she gets to school.

All I know is that my daughter stopped taking a nap the day she turned 1! It was not a choice by me, it was her. She no longer needed it (even though I still could have used it). So it really should depend on whether your child actually needs the nap or not. Mine didn't anymore so I didn't fight it.