How to Get Your Kids on a Back-to-School Sleep Schedule

Summer is the season of late nights and no alarm clocks. But after two months of blissful, routine-free life, the first week of school can be a rude awakening for kids and parents alike. “One-third of the general population does not get enough sleep,” says pediatric pulmonologist and pediatric sleep medicine specialist Courtney Quinlan, DO, with Lehigh Valley Reilly Children’s Hospital.

The key to easing back into normalcy without feeling exhausted is to establish a sleep schedule ahead of school starting. Here are Dr. Quinlan’s sleep tips for how to give your kids a healthy start to school. (Bonus: You’ll benefit from this just as much as your kids!)

Making sure your child gets enough sleep is critical for overall health. “Children that do not get enough sleep may suffer from physical, mental and behavioral issues,” Dr. Quinlan says. “You may be surprised by how much sleep your child needs.”

Age, temperament and developmental differences can influence how much sleep a child needs. However, the following is how much total daily sleep the National Sleep Foundation recommends a child should get according to their age group:

• Preschoolers (3-5 years): 10-13 hours (including naps)
• School-aged children (6-13 years): 9-12 hours
• Teenagers (14-17 years): 8-10 hours

While your child may fall slightly above or below the suggested range, it’s important to set a specific “sleep goal” for your child and, here comes the important part, stick with it.

A 2014 National Sleep Foundation study found that children slept better when parents helped implement a healthy bedtime routine and sleep schedule. According to Dr. Quinlan, there are four keys to a healthy bedtime routine:

• Disconnect electronics. “Ideally, you shouldn’t be sleeping with a phone beside you. In addition, you should put away electronics and get the screens off 30 minutes to an hour before bedtime.”
• Focus on relaxing. “Spend the last hour before bed engaging in calm activities, like reading.”
• Set a cool room temperature. “People tend to sleep better in cooler environments. We suggest between 60-67 degrees.”
• Limit snacks after dinner. "You should avoid having anything to eat two hours before bedtime as it can lead to poor sleep quality.

Unfortunately, it takes some time to properly adjust from a summer to school sleep schedule. Allowing four to six weeks to make the transition will make it more gradual and less jarring.

“The earlier you start the better,” Dr. Quinlan says. “The goal is to adjust your bedtime in small increments to achieve a specific number of hours of sleep each night.”

She suggests going to bed and waking up 15 minutes earlier every three to seven days (with a goal of 30 minutes per week).

So for example, if your teen has been staying up until 1 a.m. and waking up at 10 a.m. every day this summer, the first night should look like 12:45 a.m.-9:45 a.m., and by the end of Week 1, it will be at 12:30 a.m.-9:30 a.m.

“You eventually want to target your child’s wake-up time to match the wake-up time for school,” Dr. Quinlan says. “The ultimate goal is to try to achieve the recommended sleep time for each age while you are maintaining the desired wake-up time to be ready for school.”