Advice please on having to drop the nap for preschool

[choc]

Aidan still sleeps 1hr30 - 2hrs everyday around 1.30pm.  He sleeps well at night from 7.30 to 7/7.30.
Once or twice a week he sleeps in the car for his nap and only does 30mins and he copes ok with this.
He starts preschool in January doing 3 full days, Mon, Tues and Wed and then he will continue with his child minder on Thurs and Fri.  He will be 3 years and 3 months.
He will not be able to nap at preschool and I am scared!  How do I prepare for this?

Would it be best to have the naps gone completely by January or still let him nap on the days he isn't at preschool (Thursday to Sunday)?

I have heard different advice from cutting the nap time down gradually, to doing a nap one day then the next day no nap, 1 day on 1 day off.  And how early should I start?
Any advice please?

[Buttonbobs]

Hi there. I only have a 21 month old LO so please feel free to ignore my advice as I haven't really btdt, but when E started at nursery she was still taking a morning nap and sometimes a CN or EBT, but the room she was going into only allowed for one nap at 12.30. I worried about it to begin with but E just sort of sorted it herself and adjusted.

IIWM in your situation I'd probably keep going as I am for now as there's quite a while before January and your DS could start to move towards dropping the nap anyway before them. There's so much going on at nursery and ore-school he'll probably manage without a nap, even if he needs an earlier Bt to cope to begin with and keeps the naps on days at home for longer until he adjusts properly.

If in the meantime, you feel he's heading towards dropping the nap anyway, you can do help him to do so.

[choc]

Thanks for the reply. Yes I am hoping it will happen naturally but no signs yet!

[michaeljacknnugg]

Hey there,

I have BTDT! My guy is 5.5 and started dropping the nap at age 2 (his choice). So I'm thinking that by the time January comes around your litte guy will be ready to either drop the nap himself or to miss out on a nap on preschool days and catch up on the other days.

FWIW nap capping didn't work for us but intermittent days of napping did. We just reduced the days that he had a nap - basically stopped offering one and let him fall asleep if he really needed to! The whole process took us approx 6 months but we did start it very young.

[choc]

I think intermittent days will work better for us as he is horrible if he is woken. He nearly had a no nap day yesterday for the first time and his behaviour was awful by 3.30! He had had a super busy morning at the farm with his friends though so was very worn out. I let him have a nap in the car til 4.15 and then woke him only for him to have the biggest tantrum of his life!