would you start with early nights for the kids now or the night before school?

Question

i feel as though its mean to spoil their xmas hols, but should i get them back into the school routine? they are 6 and 9 and have stayed up till midnight and slept in till eleven while i have had time off work.

Answer 1

I totally understand your dilemma. I have three daughters, 12, 14, and 16. I work for the schools, so we have all been staying up late and sleeping in. I go back to work tomorrow, they go back to school Monday. Tonight we will all be back on our routine. No matter how old they are, it is my responsibility to make sure they are fully rested come Monday morning. Luckily my husband agrees and is eager to get us all back on schedule...especially since he gets no time off at all.

Answer 2

My children are 7 and 8 and for the past week we have been getting as close to the bedtime routine so that it wont be too much of a shock for them, we let them stay up very late on new years eve but that was all - the rest of the hols they have been able to stay up an hour more than usual, and they don't stay in bed late in the morning, as this is just awful and lazy, you miss so much of the day if you get up late. children need their sleep and they need routine.

Answer 3

I would get them on the schedual as soon as possible. It will take a few nights at least to get back into routine. If it was a week before, I would put them to bed 15-30 minutes earlier every night. Do your night time routine, bath, brush, book, then bed. To help the process, set out outfits and accessories the night before. Lay them out for them to put on in the morning. It really cuts your getting out the door time in half or more.

Answer 4

Do it now, they'll only give you loads of gip the night before school and go in tired the next day. Best to get through the 'I'm not tired' bit and back into the routine in advance. My sister-in-law keeps them in the routine all holiday apart from one or two days but she also sends her nine year old to bed at seven every day which I think is way to early.

Answer 5

It takes about a week to get back into a sleep routine, so I would say it's best to start now, not the night or two before.

Answer 6

I would start soon or you are all going to have an extremely hard time dealing with going to bed earlier and getting up early. Your body gets used to whatever schedule you set, so start it now, by the time school starts again you will have a great start on having a good schedule. Cool of you to let your kids have fun during the holiday's though!

Answer 7

The best thing for them is to keep to their routine or it's gonna be hell once they're back to school hours. I'd say some nights but now that it's only days till they go back they should get used to it again!

Answer 8

get them in the routine a few days before they have to go to school, it's easier on their systems so they don't drag their feet when the day comes and can get back into thier routine without added stress. It'll be a more natural transition instead of associating tiredness etc with going back to school and thus making this a regular occurance after breaks (hating to go back to school)

Answer 9

You need to transition them back to their regular sleep routine. In the future keep in mind weekends and holidays shouldn't result in a 3+ hour time change in bedtime, try something like 10:00 or 10:30.

Answer 10

You might want to get the started now. That does not mean you have to turn around and have them be in bed at 9pm or something like that. Just start making them go to bed say around 11pm and wake them up at 9am, then the next night maybe 10:30 and wake them up at 8:30am and so on. Just slowly do it until its time for them to be back at school.