In Part One, I talked more about bedtime issues with young children. Here, I will talk about bedtime issues with our older kids.

3. Preschoolers through High School (Preschoolers may be young for these ideas; please adjust as they fit your individual child.)

a. Set a bedtime by age or grade and stick to it, for the most part. Make exceptions when needed, of course, But, having a “rule” takes the fight out. If one of my kids wants to argue about the bedtime, I can explain that it’s the “family rule” and, somehow, that makes it less able to be fought with? They don’t get mad at me anymore, at least. They get mad at the rule. (At our house, if you really don’t like the rule, you can also bring that up for discussion – but at some other point than the time at which you want to break the rule!) Bedtimes at our house are as follows:
1. Babies and toddlers: varies depending on child; approx 7pm
2. 5th grade and under: 8pm
3. 6th-8th grade: 9pm
4: 9th grade and up: 10pm
Weekends are one hour later, all around. We really make very few exceptions because the kids seem to function very well on strict routine and don’t ask for a lot of exceptions. You will likely find that kids who didn’t have much routine in their early lives literally crave it now that they are in a stable home and family environment.

b. Do not remind your kids that it is bedtime. Unless they are still very young or unless they actually have low IQ concerns or other brain damage (some FAS issues qualify here), don’t assume your child has forgotten his bedtime. It was 9pm yesterday, it’s 9pm today, it will be 9pm tomorrow. If you have a visible clock, let your child own the responsibility. You might be surprised at how readily they step up to it. And, if they don’t, try hard to keep it their responsibility. If 9:10 comes and then he remembers, that’s fine…..thank you for being responsible about your bedtime…..and tomorrow, you will go to bed 10 minutes early then? Now, I do sometimes call out, if I notice it’s 8:45, something like “Hey guys, it’s 15minutes before 9.” – I’m not a total hard nose. I know that Nancy Thomas has recommended, for working with hard kiddos, a consequence of one chore per minute late on bedtime. That’s an option we’ve used before as well. Again, this method is not punishment at all. It’s to help the child be responsible for himself in a healthy way. If you’ve adopted a child who has not had healthy opportunities to care for himself in an appropriate way, then this is a great way to help him.

More ideas in Part Three= click here