Ideas for keeping toodler stay in room in early morning ?

[Lison]

My 2 1/2 daughter has started to wake up early5h30am which she never did before. She is also very cranky in the evening. She goes to bed at 7h45pm. Does anyone know of a trick to make her stay in her room in the morning so she doesn't wake my other baby ? Has anyone tried putting an alarm clock in their children's room telling them they can only get up when it rings ? Does it work? Any suggestion would be appreciated.

[anna*]

Yep! We have a baby gate at my little guys bedroom door, so he can't get out, and we bought a GroClock which shows a moon when it is night and a sun when he can get up. For over a year he used to work at 5.30am, now I usually have to wake him up at 7.30!

[Lison]

Thank you very much for the suggestion about the GroClock. I will definitely look for one. I'm sure she will love it. I don't know about the gate. I'm sure she will just scream and wake up her sister who has her room right beside...

[becky1969]

I think you have a routine problem.  She's doing 10 hour nights, which usually means OT at bedtime.  Wanna go over the routine and see if a tweak might help? This is a common age for a routine change.

I also second the recommendation of a 'gro clock'.  I forget what ours is called, but it has a moon for sleeping and a sun when it's time to wake up.  My son usually wakes 30 minutes or so before his clock turns to a sun, and he just sits in bed and reads/chats/sings until time to get up!

You'll have to reinforce the positive behavior a few days before they get the hang of it.

[Lison]

I think there's a few issues going on.

First of all, since 1-2 wks she started to get up a lot from her bed with excuses (have to go to the bathroom, thirsty etc.) so by the time she really gets to sleep it can be 8h30pm sometimes. We try to put her to bed at 7h45pm.

Also, this week she started a new daycare. (which she likes though)

Her routine is :

wake (used to be 7h00-7h30am) - now it's 5h30am
lunch 11h30-12h00am
nap 1h00-2h30pm
supper 6h00pm
bedtime 7h45am/8h00pm


Also, I wish they would sell the Gro-Clock in Canada...

[momtonb&ab]

we just use an IKEA light on a timer from Home Depot (total cost for both is about 15 dollars).   we tell them they can't talk/get up before their light turns on and it works!!  this will also help with sleep issues because sometimes when they are trying to be quiet they fall asleep again!!

i aslo agree that the routine needs a tweak.  if she is waking so early, i would suggest backing up nap and bedtime to meet it, so her day woudl look more like this:

wake 5:30
nap no later than 11:30
wake from nap no later than 1pm
bed no later than 6-6:30 depending on how long nap was and how tired she seems

if bedtime is not possible earlier as suggested then you could consider letting her sleep a bit longer at nap time to compensate but i think her nap is too late for how early she wakes, especially given how short the night is iykwim?

do you think you could try something more like that?