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Are your kids waking too early? Do you wish your children would sleep in just a little later? I understand completely! When your kids are waking too early in the morning, it can make them tired, and cranky and they don’t feel their best. Overall, tired kids are just not very happy kids. (Not much different from tired adults)
When our kids were young, I would put our kids to bed at 7:00. I wanted them to get a full 10-12 hours of sleep (because it helps them to be happier & healthier), but in doing so, our routine has taught them to sleep later naturally.
Update: This post was written several years ago, but it is always one of the most asked questions that I receive, so I wanted to share it again today. Our kids have continued to sleep until 7:00 (or later) thanks to this little trick. It has helped to give our kids the rest that they need (and deserve). ♥
Sleep is Essential for Children
Yes, getting a good night’s sleep is essential, so teaching our kids great wake & sleep patterns will benefit your child greatly. It will help their physical health, emotional health, and mental health.
Even going to sleep at the same time every night has an enormous impact on our kids’ educational, social, mental, and physical health.
Getting enough sleep = healthier child… better ability to stay focused, happier children… there are so many benefits to getting enough sleep. If a child wakes in the middle of the night or too early in the morning, it can cause your child to be tired, foggy, and grumpy in the day.
We have four kids and let me tell you; our kids had started waking up EARLY! Two of our kids were very early risers and I just wanted them to sleep longer so they could have the rest they needed. They were exhausted from the minute that they woke up, yet they were still waking up early.
Once I taught them how to sleep long enough to get the rest that they needed, they felt better.
Waking too early?
Is your child waking too early? You can help them learn how to sleep later.
I knew that I had to do something, many years ago, when our older kids were waking too early – around 5:00 am and 5:30 in the morning.
It was still dark outside, they were waking their siblings, causing our morning routine to begin much sooner, leaving them exhausted in the middle of the day. Naptime often came in the late morning, leaving the kids requiring a two-hour nap every day
Plus, when kids are waking too early it can cause them to be overtired by bedtime. This makes it harder for them to doze off at night. Falling asleep when you are TOO tired is just as bad as trying to fall asleep when you aren’t sleepy at all.
Bottom Line: Kids need to get plenty of sleep.
PS- our family’s normal wake-up time is at 7:00 am. I don’t consider 7:00 to be early, but 5:00 is a little out of my comfort zone. 😉
How Much Sleep Does A Child Need?
As you can see from the chart below…
Do you want a copy of this chart? I’d be happy to mail you a copy to download- just click here to send me your e-mail. Thanks!
How the sleep time charts work:
Sleep charts are simply to be used as a reference. They may not work for your family, but they are often based on experience or studies, so I usually like to try to understand them.
I liked this sleep chart (below) shared by Wilson Elementary School. If the child wakes up at a particular time, they need to go to bed at the time below that time, depending on their age.
So, according to the chart, a five-year-old would need to go to bed by 6:45 if they had to be up at 6:00)
I’d adjust it a bit, to fit your family’s schedule, but it does show that kids need a lot of sleep… and to that point, I agree.
How to help your child begin to change their “body clock”
To help our kids learn good sleep habits, we came up with this idea, and I have shared it with friends and family, and they do it, too.
It works!
We finally figured out a way to keep our kids in bed longer (giving them the chance to get enough sleep for their bodies and minds)
This idea is to naturally set our children’s internal clocks to a time that is more suited to their schedule (with preschool and grade school). It allows their bodies to sleep until it is time to wake up.
Before you begin: Determine a wake-up time for your child & practice it.
Figure out what time your child will go to bed each night and what time you’d like them to wake up. Remember that going to bed at the same time every night is so important for their health and behavior!
After you determine an appropriate wake-up time, you need to practice that number with your kids.
- If you want them to get up at 7:00, show them the number 7.
- Show it to them on a piece of paper.
- Show it to them on their clock so that they will recognize that number.
- Show it to them in books.
- Have them practice writing it.
- Talk to your child about what happens in the morning… “After you are done sleeping through the night and you are ready to wake up, you will look at the clock and see what time it is.” (more details below)
Steps to help your child sleep later:
Materials that you need:
- A digital clock
- A piece of paper (I use index cards. You can use anything!)
- Tape
- Marker or crayon
What to do next: The step-by-step way to teach your kids to sleep later.
- STEP ONE: WRITE JUST THE HOUR of the time you want the kids to come out of bed on your piece of paper.
- Write the number big (a little bigger than the number on the clock).
- Examples: 6:00? Write 6
7:00? Write 7. (This is our ‘allowed out of bed’ time)
8:00? Write 8.
.. - STEP TWO: Tape that paper over the MINUTES on your digital clock, so that all that you are left seeing is the hour and the paper.
Here is what it looks like (sorry that my time was 4:00 when I took it )
- Show your kids when the number on the clock (the hour) matches the number on their paper, they can come out of bed.
- Tip: If your child is going to share a room with another sibling, be sure that both children can see the clock from their beds.
Here is a close-up of our clock:
Why Do I Not Allow Them to Come Out of Bed Earlier?
I do not let our kids get out of bed before 7:00, for safety reasons. I don’t want them in their rooms playing when I do not know about it. I want them in their beds.
(I made this rule after I had read this heart-breaking story, last year, about the little girl that died when her dresser fell on top of her while her parents were asleep in their room- it was one of those VERY HEAVY dresser/changing tables that everyone has. Her mom didn’t realize it until she (the mom) woke up for the day.
Her story has opened my eyes to the fact that dangers lurk where you don’t expect them, even with furniture that you would NEVER expect to fall over… same with toys…. you just never know which ones have hidden dangers, even if you don’t expect it).
For that reason, I don’t want our kids awake without me knowing.
Do Kids Have an Internal Alarm?
I have read multiple studies suggesting that there are reasons that our bodies tend to wake us up, but oftentimes our bodies get out of sync. Science News says: “Just like an alarm clock, the body’s internal clock can be reset.”
I believe this to be true, as well. After we implemented the 7:00 wake time and our children practiced it, they began sleeping later. Now, when I am up in the morning and I check on them before 7:00 am, they are all still sound asleep.
Around 7:00-7:30, they begin to naturally awaken, thanks to resetting their internal alarms.
TIP: I should remind you that I didn’t start this until our kids were almost THREE YEARS OLD and could understand it.
How to Teach Kids to Sleep Later:
- When they come out of their room the first few days early (and they will), just take them back to bed and say “You can come out at 7:00 when the number of the clock matches. Are they the same now? Ok, sweetheart- go back to bed.” (put them back into bed).
. - Now what you will want to do is make sure that when it DOES turn seven, you go in and say “Ok! It’s time to come out now! It’s 7:00!! Great job!” Do this for over a week, until they get it.
. - As with anything, you need to remember that you have to TEACH your kids this new rule. You can not expect them to sleep until 7:00 tomorrow, just because you started this today. Give it a week or two, and you will have them sleeping later.
- When you tuck your kids in at night & lie down with them, talk about the morning and what it will look like. Talk about what number they will see before they get out of bed.
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Tips:
1. Take it slowly. If your child has been getting up at 5, don’t expect him/her to sleep until 7. You have to do this slowly. I would change the clock for this, too, so that at the real 5:30 (first few days) their clock would say 7 (or your goal hour).
I would move it every few days over a few weeks until they were waking up at 7:00. (Just my two cents)
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2. Another completely different idea that a friend on Facebook gave me is to have your lamp set to a timer (like the kind that you get when you are going on vacation) and have it turn on at a specific time (example: 7:00 am). When the light goes on, they can get out of bed.
3. Another idea: you could try an alarm clock like this one that I found on Amazon with my affiliate link: (The light is red when they need to stay in bed and green when they can come out)
Good luck!
If you would like access to my sleep schedule, free sleep course & printable chart, join here
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We have a 5yr old who has had a gro-clock since he was 2. It’s fantastic. He goes to sleep around 7-7.30 and we have his sun set to come up at 6am – he wont get out of bed until then. Our problem is, however, that he will yell out to us in the night. Sometimes he has a bad dream, or his covers aren’t straight, or his pillow has dropped off his bed. It’s exhausting as when he wakes me up (3, 4 or 5am) I don’t get back to sleep. Any ideas?
Oh goodness- our son did that, too! Try this: https://www.yourmodernfamily.com/waking-at-night-advice/
Oh my goodness. We finally did the clock number match with our 3 year old daughter last night. She can recognize her numbers up to 10, so I figured we would finally give it a try. Both her and her 5 year old brother have known for several months that wake up time is 7. Problem was that they would wake up at 6:25-6:40 and come and ask if it was 7 yet. We also hung our sons analog clock back up since he can tell time with that. Yay for this morning. Our son slept until 7:05 and our daughter slept until 7:15!! Thanks for a great idea.
Oh that’s awesome!! Thanks for sharing that with me! 🙂
i have that street light lamp and my kid just completely ignores it. its so frustrating. i did the digital clock match thing then moved on to the lamp, nothing. I’ve caught him doing potentially dangerous things too or waking his older sister but no amount of gentle lecturing works. he says that by the time he wakes in the morning he forgets (he’s 5)
if i or my husband are in bed with him however (very rare times like sleepovers maybe) he falls back asleep for another hour or more! he definitely needs the sleep so it upsets me even more when he unwittingly robs himself of much-needed sleep!
any help/advice/suggestions/anything!?
I would take away all electronics for the day if he is out of bed before 7:00. We had to do that once with our 4 year old and he never did it again. (Now we do tell him the reasons that he can come out, but that he needs to come right into my room first to tell me. Examples: to go to the bathroom, if he is sick, etc…)
What dod you do if your child gets out of bed before 7? I just know my child will get out of bed over and over again. He is very stubborn. How many times did you have to do this? Would you spank if they did not stay in bed?
HELP! My 4 year old son goes to bed around 7:30, 2 year old goes to bed around 7, and 6 year old goes to bed around 8, but the older 2 kids don’t usually FALL ASLEEP for an hour after they’ve been put to bed. 4 Year old wakes up at 5:30 and has to go potty. I let him because obviously this isn’t something he can help – its first thing in the morning and he hasn’t peed all night right?! Anyway, I put him back to bed, tell him to stay in bed until 7 (just like you suggest). He usually gets up and starts playing, or comes out 2 more times to ask for something else, or for random reasons (my toe hurts was this morning’s excuse). Anyway, my 6 year old will wake up around 6 as well to go potty, but the 2 year old shares a room with her and is a light sleeper, so as SOON as 6 year old wakes up, 2 year old is up as well. The kids are so cranky when they get up this early (which is most of the time). in fact, on days when 6 year old doesn’t have school (she goes full days to Kindergarten 2 sometimes 3 days a week), I make her nap too because she is so cranky and tired. 4 year old sometimes naps, but that depends on the day as well, sometimes he plays quietly in his room which is ok with me. But honestly, the getting up so early and being so cranky is really exhausting for this momma. What else can I do? They need the sleep, they’ve been getting sick ALOT this spring.
That’s really hard. Can you try waking him before you go to bed to use the potty and hopefully push back that wake up time?
Thats a good Idea! I’ll definitely try that tonight!!!
I’m surprised that nobody mentioned the sleep trainer from Zazu. We use the sleep trainer for our little one since October last year. I can recommend this product to all of you, specially for parents with a full schedule. For the one who’s interested in seeing a bit more
Chris
Thank you very much for sharing this excellent idea with us! ?
I read the same story and it caused me to get anchors for all of our furniture. I think that is a better safety device, because kids could still potentially get up even when you don’t expect them to do so. The woman from the story said her child was not normally up that early.
What if they unplug the clock and play with it? My kids (7, 5, and 3) have all been early risers since they were young. The 3 yr old still takes naps, but the other two don’t. They all go to bed at 8pm and get up somewhere between 5-6am. The 7 yr old is learning to sleep a little longer, but not much. They get up and destroy the house (mostly the 5 and 3 yr old are instigators) so I’ve tried locking them in their room but then they need to use the bathroom. No amount of consequences seem to make any difference. We’re often asleep and don’t know when they get up. I’m not only worried about their safety, but I am fed up with the messes they make. This has been going on for literally YEARS and I’ve tried everything. I’ve even tried the clock thing and they just play with it and mess it up so they have no idea the actual time and I have to constantly reset it.
I have our plug behind the bed now, where they can’t reach it. I have told them that they are not to touch the clock. They haven’t tried yet, thankfully. Could you try putting it up on a dresser or getting one that hangs on the wall (digital)?
THANK YOU! I started this about 3 weeks ago on our awake-at-5 kindergartner and today was the proof in the pudding day as he not only woke at 5:30 and WENT BACK TO SLEEP but then, when he woke up 30 minutes before the magic hour, he took out a book and read in bed until Dad invited him to get up early and join us on the front porch. Thank you!!!
awesome!
Thanks for your article. We have tried everything to date, including what you recommend, but my son wakes around 5am no matter what. This has been happening since he was about 2.5 years (he is now 3+ So it’s been about 8 months). It also started when he moved from a cot to a double bed.
We even bought a Gro Clock and tried that for a few weeks but my son just gets out of bed and pulls out the powercord and/or stands there demanding that the sun come out (which means wake time). We have tried cutting down his nap to just one hour, and most recently cutting out his nap completely. He goes to bed around 7pm. Since our three month old baby came along, he is even worse. The baby doesn’t wake at night so he is getting good, uninterrupted sleep during the night.
Do you think some kids just can’t sleep in, no matter what you try? We are really desperate for a solution.
Oh no. I”m sorry. Have you tried going in at 5 and letting him have a glass of milk and then put him back to bed? We had to do that with one of our kids before she went back to sleeping later.
Great post! Just an idea: Once the younger kids move to “quiet-time”, send them in with a timer. My 4 yo was constantly coming out wanting to know how much of her hour was left. Use the timer that turns all the way around, not a digital one. She didn’t understand the minutes yet, but could see that it was progressively getting to the place where it would ring and her nap would be finished. Was reassuring to her and all she needed to stay in her bed till quiet-time was over.
That’s a great idea! 🙂
My daugthers go to bed at 8 pm because is dark outside and they understand is bedtime. In the morning if they wake up early they ask me if “the sun is up”? If its too early I say not yet and they go back to sleep ultil it´s sunny outside (normally till 8 am). This helps me a lot with my 2 year old one. By the way, we live in Mexico.
My 2 1/2 year had adjusted to getting himself up every day at 4am, after going to bed at 6pm. Plus he stopped taking naps. He is ready to go at 4am, despite it still being dark and pretty much nothing I do can convince him to go back to back. Has anyone used this method with a child that young? This is wreaking havoc on me because getting up at 4am isn’t working well for me.
That’s a good idea! I will have to try that when my babies are a bit older. My oldest is 2 but usually she will just grab a book or stuffed animal that I have set by the bed then just lay back down. And I encourage all parents to anchor their furniture as well. I also read that article about the little girl who’s dresser fell on her and I ran out and got anchors that very day! Better safe than sorry.
We are the same way- we secure everything.
My eleven year old daughter doesn’t and can’t sleep all night practically every night and she just can’t fall asleep at all. And I have tried everything to try to get some sleep but it nothing ever works . I mean it would be fine for her to sleep an hour downstairs on the couch in the daytime,but i m worried for about when school starts again on Monday (because of winter break) and this was even happening during school and she would fall asleep in class in almost all of them (she’s in middle school) . Now that it’s anew year I want her to start of sleeping in her bed not on a school desk. Any tips?????
Oh no. I’m sorry. I think that I would talk to your doctor and maybe get a sleep study done (we are doing that with one of our kids).