It’s the eternal challenge for most parents which seems to get even harder after the summer holidays – how to get children into a good bedtime routine.
One thing all of those who care for little ones will know is how much children love staying up past their bedtime – but you might be shocked to find out what time they should actually go to sleep. According to experts, the answer to that question all depends on their age and what time they woke up that day.
As we previously reported, a sleep chart circulated by a teacher at Wilson Elementary School in America on Facebook says five year olds should be going to bed as early as 6.45pm, depending what time they woke up that day. For children aged eight and nine, bedtime should be any time between 7.30pm and 8.45pm-9pm.
Covering ages five to 12, the chart shows that children aged five should go to bed from 6.45pm to 8.15pm, depending on their wake-up time. Meanwhile, kids aged 11 and 12 should be asleep anytime from 8.15pm to 9.45pm.
However, it adds that if your five year old gets up at 6.30am, they’ll be ready to go to sleep at 7.15pm. But if they woke up slightly later than 7am, they’ll be ready to nod off at 7.30 in the evening.
While an eight-year-old who gets up at 6.45 in the morning will be ready to go to sleep at 8.15pm, the same aged child who woke later, at 7.30 am, won’t be ready for bed until 9pm.
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According to the NHS, children all need a certain amount of sleep, depending on their age. For example, newborn babies require at least 16 hours sleep in a 24-hour period and by the time babies are six months old, they should nap three or four hours in the day and sleep 11 hours at night.
It’s recommended that children should continue napping until the age of three when naps should be around 45mins, if at all. NHS guidance advises that by the time children are at school, they will need approximately 11 hours of sleep per night.
At age seven children should have 10 hours and 30 minutes sleep a night and when they reach age 10 they should be getting around nine hours 45minutes sleep. According to the NHS, nine hours is the minimum children need right up until age 16.
However, after the school sleep chart went viral several parents weighed in on the sleep suggestions slamming it as unrealistic. One said: “In a perfect world, yes. But not every child is the same nor can a lot of parents follow this because of lifestyle. For example I work 12 hour shifts, going by this chart I would only see my children on weekends for the first six years of their lives.”
Another said: “As a single parent who leaves for work at 7am work and doesn’t get home until around 6pm everyday, this is completely unrealistic, I still have to feed him (ie cook dinner), get his homework/studying done, bath time, getting ready for bed and bedtime story, not to mention trying to get in some quality time I’m lucky to get him in bed before nine.”
But others said the chart was a guideline and parents should apply common sense and a routine bedtime. One said: “Kids need a bedtime. I know people who have kids that are around five and they tell me they can’t watch The Walking Dead because their kid is still up… on a Sunday night.. No! Put your kids to bed. Kids need structure.”
Another said: “I think this is meant to be a guideline not a hard and fast rule… the point is don’t let your kid stay up till 10, 11, 12 at night when they have to be at school at eight.”
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