Management round table: should parents have the say on sleep?

David Wright – Paint Pots Pre-School and Nursery

This is a difficult situation which requires diplomacy and a sense of balance between the child’s needs and the parents’ wishes. 

As part of  getting to know  a child, we ask about his/her sleep routines at home. We also  work with parents to set a common expectation regarding care, with a primary focus on the needs of each individual child. During the child’s settling sessions with us, we liaise closely with parents to provide a consistent pattern of care between home and our setting. In most cases, the establishment of this partnership builds trust and sets a shared agreement on what is best for each child. Where a carer insists that we are to ignore a child’s clear needs, in order to satisfy their guidance – for example,  ‘my child must never sleep in the afternoon’, we would explain how we must respond to the child’s needs and negotiate a resolution that recognises both the carers’ motivation, such as trying to get their child to sleep all through the night, and their child’s need for physical rest during the day. Sometimes, a shortish ‘power nap’ can provide this, without compromising the child’s subsequent ability to sleep all night. In this case, it is a question of managing the balance and maintaining the overriding principle of meeting each child’s individual needs.