If you are a parent you will know about the problems that can happen when it comes to getting children to bed. Kids often just want to stay up longer, and even after you get them to their bedrooms and beds they may not want to go to sleep. So what can be done to help get children to bed at a reasonable time and off to sleep once they are there?

Bedtime Routines

Having a regular time for bed is a good habit for our children to have. Depending on what age our kids are we need to decide on a time they can stay up to and then make this a regular bedtime routine. Hopefully a child with such a routine will get used to it, so when you say “It’s bedtime,” they will be all ready to go to their bedrooms, and ready to go to sleep.

Giving a child advance warning that it is nearly time for bed is a good idea too. Perhaps an hour before their usual bedtime, you can gently tell them what the time is and that they should be getting ready for bed soon. Perhaps they could have a warm bath before bed too. This is a good way of getting a child to relax, so they will be ready to drift off into the land of dreams.

Of course, the routine can be broken for special occasions, like birthdays and holidays, but most of the time you get the child to stick to it.

Reading bedtime stories

Reading a bedtime story is a really good way to get a child ready to go to sleep. It can be something they look forward too, especially if the stories are about favorite characters or from favorite books. Having stories read to you as a child can help establish a pattern of reading before sleep that stays with you into adult life. Many people enjoy reading in bed and find it a good way of drifting off to sleep.

Relaxing Music

Singing a lullaby used to be the traditional way of getting a child to sleep and today we can still sing songs or play relaxing music at bedtime. This is especially good for very young children, who love nursery rhymes. It is something enjoyable they can come to associate with their bedtime routine.

Waking up in the Morning

If all goes well, a child will get a really good night’s sleep and be all ready for the next day when they wake in the morning, when they may have to go to school after their breakfast. An alarm clock with a sound the child likes, but is still noisy enough to rouse them, can be a great way of getting a child to wake up and get up. Nowadays, as well as physical alarm clocks, there are alarms on the Internet to be found at Google Play and elsewhere online. Getting up at the right time is just as important as a routine as going to bed.

This is solely my personal assessment and I was not compensated for it.