OK ladies,
My 4 year old twins still nap. My daughter has been fighting me on it for about a month now and my son is pretty good. She'll nap for about 1 1/2 hrs and he'll do about 2. They go to bed around 8:30 and wake at 6:30. I know she needs one because she is out of control when she is over-tired - relentless, not listening, talking back.... I know that they are 4 (most kids give it up much earlier) and I'm lucky that they do. I also think I'm making them take one for selfish reasons…I need the break. They are very active! My question is….how did you do it? Did you stop cold turkey, or a couple of days a week? I know my time is almost up….the break keeps me sane when they are acting up. I've tried "quiet time" a couple of times- but it just turned out to be more "play time". Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.
They are in preschool 2 days for 2 and a half hours. Next year they will still be in preschool but 3 days (Dec birthdays). I keep telling them "if you are in preschool, you nap. When you are in kindergarten, you will nap if you need to. They will go to kindergarten full time. Thanks for the advice. I'll keep giving them naps and keep our schedule. If it's one of those days where they really don't - I think I'll try quiet time where I sit down w/them for a little longer. We'll see…..
As always, good advice, ladies!
My 5 year old still takes a nap. I think at 4 they still need a nap I wouldnt do away with it until they go to school.. And you do need a break that is not selfish.
i honestly do not believe "most" kids give up naps by age 4 - who told you that? my 4 year old goes to preschool and they still have nap time, every day. on a quieter, lazy day, my son can get away without a nap, heck he COULD go every day without one, but he gets tired and irritable in the evenings, if so. i see no reason to stop them. so she sleeps a little less easily than her brother - so what? i say keep the same routine you're in now. soon enough they'll be in school and won't have a choice! naps are GOOD! :)
I wouldn't take it away. Even if they don't sleep, I think they benefit from the "quiet time" when there is less interaction and they can decompress for awhile. You are not being selfish. They need that time!
Believe it or not we have 3 children ages 10, 6 1/2, and 4 1/2 and they ALL will take naps... Our oldest we are starting to let have quiet rest time on the weekends (she will read or play her DS quietly). Our 6 1/2 y/o still NEEDS a nap, and sometimes she will lay down after school on her own. I try not to let her sleep for more than an hour. Our son is not yet in school and he lays down every day. I think the key for some children is that the nap time has to be a little later...our son naps around 1:30. Establish a routine and stick with it! You can still have your quiet time and they could probably use the rest! Good luck with it! :)
Yes my 3.75 year old still naps almost every day - and she totally needs it. I put her in and if she hasn't fallen asleep she still stays there and plays or reads quietly by herself for 1.5 hrs or so, but most days she naps about 2 hrs. If I thought she didn't need it I'd avoid it but she totally does.
We all need a break - go naps!!!
My son is 4.5 years old and still naps everyday in the afternoon.
I know when he gets tired and how long he can go.
My daughter is 8, and will nap if/when she is tired. Usually after school.
I just go by my kids cues.
It is not an absolute give up naps or not. I have them nap when tired. If not, they have quiet time.
Even in Kindergarten, they have a nap time. For example.
Also, kids need lots of runaround time. At this age especially.
So, in the mornings, I have runaround time for my son. Who is still home with me on some days, and other days he goes to Preschool part time.
A kid this age, IS active. Thus, they NEED to get out their physicality, daily. I do this in the mornings for my son. We go to the park, runaround and do physical stuff. To get out his yah-yah's. etc.
THEN, it is lunch, and then wind-down and nap. It is a process. A kid this age needs to wind-down, too. Before naps or bedtime.
My kids KNOW the routine. It is the same everyday. And I verbally cue them that "nap time is coming up... after lunch we wind-down.... " etc.
It is not a stopping naps cold-turkey kind of thing.
My son, often just needs to nap otherwise he turns into a fussy overly-hyper and overly tired, boy.
So I gauge him and go by his cues.
For quiet time, I make everything dark and quiet.
Explain to them, it is quiet time.
AND for my kids, I tell them it is quiet time for ME, too.
That works for them.
But you EXPLAIN to them, what quiet time it.
Nothing electronic, nothing noisy etc.
Kids need naps to grow and develop well. Keep the naps as long as they need them. In Kindergarten they still lay down and if they don't sleep they have to lay there and rest. After Christmas break the teacher will start weaning them off naps.
They may even need naps during the Summer before 1st grade. A lot of my Kindergarten and 1st grader kids in childcare would ask for a cot during nap time and I let them if they had shown me they would be good and not wake the littler kids up playing around.
If you can tell they still need naps, I say give them naps. My daughter napped until she was over 5. My son is over 4 now and he's still such a napper. Like clock work. A 1 hour nap at 1:00. Tired kids are the worst!
My 4 year seemed to alternate napping or not napping every few days or every few weeks during his third year. I also tried to "make" him nap for selfish reasons since my toddler still naps and I was pregnant and desperate for a break. To get him to sleep though I had to lie down with him for up to 45 minutes and then he would nap for a few hours, so I know he needed one, but it got too miserable trying to get them down together and he fought it so hard I would just end up cranky. I put him to bed a little earlier now so he is asleep when his little brother goes up for bed, but they both get enough sleep between bedtimes and my toddler napping. I recently started taking my oldest to his room for 30 to 60 minutes of quiet reading time and he is enjoying it (but not as much as I am!). I think you can take it one day at a time--some days they do wear themselves out too much or my oldest will nod off in the car and finish a short nap on the couch.
This is such a tough phase. They need it but don't want it. I structured some quiet time, as others have suggested and as you see in all-day preschools. My stepdaughter's kids were given little fold-out stuffed chairs, sort of like a convertible sofa but just for one kid. They had cartoon characters on them. During "nap time" the kids got to sit in their special fold-out chair with a book and a stuffed animal. Half the time they dozed off, and otherwise they just rested. You could let your daughter do something like that and let your son nap. If he wants to do what she's doing, that's okay too. At least there is quiet time. You can tell them that YOU need quiet time too. I know you are having trouble with this but if it's done every day, they'll get the hang of it. Call it reading time, or let them listen to quiet music. You may need to separate them so they don't fire each other up. Let them see you reading too. I know you probably want the time to get stuff done, but at least until they get into the routine, I'd show them that everyone needs quiet time, including mom. Let everyone go to their own special corner and relax. You might let them choose where they want to do this, but not whether or not to do it!
My son napped well past the age of 4 as well. It was great! One thing I will add is that, had he started kindergarten at the age of 5, it would have been afternoon kindergarten only as they alternate in our town. There is no way he could have handled that when he was tired, having been so active all morning long. So we held him out until he was six, and started him in morning kindergarten. It was absolutely worth the extra year of preschool to have him get another nap-less year under his belt! Keep that in mind if your kids continue to need naps.
Good luck getting through this transition!
That's great that they still nap! I agree that it's good for moms, too. LOL. I think that kids will nap for as long as they need it. I don't think that naps just all of a sudden stop. Kids may have have a day here and there where they don't nap, and it probably happens slowly, though I could be wrong. I know that that's how it happened with friends and family. My 3.5 yo still naps (Yay!), and I hope he continues. If he does skip a nap, we put him to bed aerlier at night, and that seems to work.
Best of luck to you.
Peace,
S.
you're soooo lucky. my daughter was done at 3. my daughter is now 4.5 and my son is 2.5. he still naps for abotu 1.5 hours.... so she has quiet time. i will put on a movie for her, or she can do her leapster, or her tag reader, or color...something quiet while her brother sleeps, and lets me check email, read a for a bit, fold laundry etc.
do they share a room? if they are in seperate rooms i'd still enforce quiet time... they go in their room and if they sleep, they sleep, if they don't that's fine too, they need to stay in their room and play/do quiet activities for the hour and a half.
are they in preschool at all - maybe on those days you do naps b/c they will tend to be more tired and the other days just enforce quiet time.
the other thing is stopping naps may make them sleep later... you may find they are ready for bed at 7:30 and will sleep til 7:30 too.
HI, I only have a 6 month old, but i know what you mean by the naps give you a break, a moment to breath is more like it to me. mines is slowly shorting her nap times. mines isn't as old as your's but i don't think you should stop cold turkey take what you can get even if its just for 30 minutes. and i don't know if they are in school yet but if not they will be soon. so if you are a stay at home M. then you really will get a few hours to ur self.
