Here are my notes for making the transition to a single nap as requested: Average age to move to a single nap is 12 - 16 months. Signs to look for • The child may begin to sleep longer for their morning nap and progressively shorter for the afternoon nap (this is the most common scenario) • Many children who are ready to make the switch will just simply play in their cot for the entire afternoon nap and never sleep, or put up much more protest when you put them down for the nap, or if they do sleep in the afternoon it will be too late in the day and you need to wake them to preserve their bedtime. • Occasionally it is the morning nap that becomes the challenge and the afternoon nap becomes the long one. • These things won’t happen everyday but if you find that 4 to 5 days of the week, the above scenarios are happening, then it may be time to make the switch. Making the switch • Transitioning from two naps to one is not an easy thing to do and it can take a month or more before your child seems comfortable with the change. • Your child may still seem tired at their usual naptime but try taking them outside, or giving them a snack when you notice that morning grumpiness set in. To shift to a single nap, use the following approach: 1. Start by moving your child’s morning nap later by half an hour. So if they usually napped at 10:00, you move it to 10:30 for 3 days and let them sleep as long as they like. 2. You should still put your baby down for quiet time around 2-2:30 to help take the edge off until bedtime. Leave them in the cot for one hour. They may not sleep, but at least they have had some down time on their own. If your child does fall asleep, don’t let them sleep past 3:30 or 4:00 so you can keep bedtime on track. 3. If your child went for quiet time and did not sleep, then you will need to move bedtime forward to as early as 6:30 to prevent them from becoming overtired. 4. After 3 days, move the morning naptime 30 minutes later for another 3 days. Follow the same advice for the afternoon quiet time and bedtime. 5. Keep moving morning naptime 30 minutes later every three days or so. Once the nap falls at 11.30am, there may not be time for afternoon quiet time, and you will probably find your toddler very hard to deal with around supper time. Remember, it’s ok to put them to bed early - that is a much better solution than living with a raging toddler! 6. After another few days move naptime to 12:00. This might mean that you have to move lunch time earlier to 11:30am for a while. Don’t be surprised if for a few weeks, your little one starts nodding off in the highchair. Reminders • You will probably find that naptime hovers between 12:00 and 12:30 for several months (1:00 PM can be too late for some children, as they have missed they optimal window and are now catching their second wind). • Be patient - this is not an easy transition and it may take a month or more before you notice that your child is handling the switch much better. I also suggest that throughout the transition your child should be going to bed somewhere between 6:30 and 7:30 at the latest.
Posted on: Mon, 27 Jan 2014 10:05:00 +0000
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