How to Get Babies to Sleep at a Day Care

Transitioning to day care can be tough for babies, and for their parents. If your baby doesn't nap well at day care, you may be at a loss as to how to help her get some rest. Communicate with the day care as often as possible to find out what's going on and if there has been improvement in the sleep issue. Explain to the day care what her schedule is like at home and the ways you are able to get her to sleep.

Instructions

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      Keep sleep times the same at home and day care. For example, if you get your baby up at 7 on weekday mornings to go to day care, make sure he wakes up at the same time on weekends. While it can be hard not to get to sleep in on weekends, keeping a sleep schedule that stays the same each day can help him sleep better no matter where he is. Ask the day care what time nap is and put your baby down at that same time on his days off.

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      Offer a comfort object. If your baby is extremely attached to a small blanket or stuffed animal or pacifier, make sure that object goes to day care with her. If she goes to sleep with the comfort object at night, she may associate it with sleep and sleep better at day care with it there, suggests SleepLady.com.

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      Find out everything you can about nap time at day care. Your child might be having trouble sleeping because the sleep environment is so different than at home. For instance, if you normally rock your baby to sleep before laying him down, while the day care just lays him down with no preamble, or vice versa, this could be making it hard for him to realize it's time to sleep. In some cases, some babies being ready to nap earlier or later than others might mess with your baby being able to sleep. If possible, ask the day care workers to try to lay your baby down early in the process of getting the babies down for nap, as this might help a bit. If the facility plays lullabies during nap time while you keep the room quiet, that might also disturb your baby's napping. While you probably won't be able to change the day care's habits and policies, you can adjust your routines at home to make them more compatible with the day care's if you wish.

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