Just like you need to rest after a hard day at work, your child equally needs to rest after spending a day in childcare Chatswood. Adequate rest gives your child time to unwind and reflect on the day’s activities.
Rest also promotes mental growth as their brain process and store these activities in the form of memories. It benefits your child physically too for they can relax their muscles after playing.
While many parents think that rest only comes in the form of naps, there are many other ways through which your child can rest in the evenings, on weekends and even during holidays.
You, therefore, need to come up with a rest routine which your child understands and follows. We have some ideas for you. Check them out.
Develop A Schedule
Between the time your child gets back home from childcare to when they go back to bed at night, there will be several activities they will be involved in. Examples include bathing, snacking, a bonding time, dinner, among many others.
While these tasks all seem obvious, you could end up skipping some due to poor time management or other factors. You might also spend too much time on one activity, leaving no time for the rest. Doing them in no particular order actually confuses your child, making it harder for them to adapt.
Make a simple plan which shows which activities come first and the time you intend to spend on each. This will not only help your child learn to do them faster but also leave them adequate time to relax before bedtime.
Be Consistent
Developing a schedule is only the beginning. Your child’s brain is still developing and so it only works better where there’s consistency. Shuffling the order of completing tasks only makes things worse.
Remember they have had a long day playing with their peers and learning. Having them learn and unlearn their schedule so often doesn’t help the situation; it only worsens it.
You need to make sure that the order of doing activities and how they are done remains the same. Your child will have a better rest routine if they understand the order of doing things when they come from childcare in Chatswood. Remind their home caregiver to stick to the same schedule even in your absence.
Work With The Caregivers
While attending Childcare Chatswood, your child is exposed to various activities. Many providers of childcare usually avail a number of activities for your child to take part in based on their age and needs. This varies from one centre to the next.
Therefore, it would be wrong to assume that the level of fatigue your child is in when they get back home is the same across every childcare.
In order to choose activities to ease your child into rest, you will need to liaise with their caregivers to understand the kind and amount of activity your child is involved in during the day and how best they can rest.
Set Aside Bonding Time
Your child will definitely want to spend time with you after attending childcare. They will want to tell you about the things they learnt at school, the games they played, the new friends they made and so forth.
Even though you want them to rest, shoving them to bed right after they get back denies them this opportunity, and this is going to affect the relationship between you and your child, leading to poor mental health.
Instead, figure out a way to spend time together after they return from childcare. You could settle for fun things like singing, storytelling, board games, reading or even drawing and painting.
Remember To Power Down
Your child’s rest is not complete until they have enough sleep. This is what will help them not to be cranky, less productive and show poor attention the next day. Lack of enough sleep also leaves your child feeling exhausted.
You can help them sleep better by creating a solid power down routine. Let your child understand their sleeping hours and why they need to sleep.
Keep them away from blue light-emitting devices because they delay sleep in young children. If possible, also shut down all the loud noises and bright lights.
What’s special about all the tips we have shared is that they are tried and tested. Many parents continue to report great results after putting them into action. Act now too. For more ideas and help on how to go about this, you can speak to your childcare provider or any other trusted childcare in Chatswood.