So I am new here, and I joined because I am also pretty new to working in daycare as well. I worked in childcare for 8 years at a family resource centre, but because it was drop-in, we didn't follow a strict schedule and we definitely didn't have nap-time. Well, here I am, in a daycare centre, and it's WAY different. We follow a pretty rigid schedule. I am only working part time because I am in uni studying ECE. I get there right when my group of 8 children are supposed to be waking up from nap time. But I don't have all the same children every afternoon. It always seems to change, and some children have a REALLY HARD TIME waking up. I almost never get my group outside on time, and one of the other teachers is pretty frustrated with me. I start by opening the blinds and turning on the lights, and then I put on some lively children's music and start waking up each child, but some of them are sleeping so deeply and it's hard to get each child awake, shoes on, pillows and blankets in their bins, mats out in the hall, take them to go pee, and get out the door to play outside. I hate forcing children to wake up, but I have no choice, because one teacher wipes all the mats and others start their van runs to pick up the school-age children from school, so there isn't anyone who can stay with the children who are still sleeping. So I'm wondering what I am doing wrong and if anyone has any tips for waking up sleeping children? Thanks!

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Maybe the other members will chime in tomorrow. You said that the group is never the same but my thought would be trying to first start to awaken those that have a hard time getting up. If they are the same ones that are in deep, try stirring them earlier than the others.

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Yeah, I'll have to try that. It's been extra hard this week because the school age children had spring break for 2 weeks so all the kids were on a different schedule, and now we're back into the regular schedule, so I think the pre-k's might be having some trouble adjusting to the (new) regular schedule. I feel like I should be able to do this on my own, because all the staff, aside from the manager, have their own group of children they are responsible for, so it doesn't really work for anyone to help me out with my kids because then they would be over the ratio. Today all of them had a hard time waking up. Some of them get there after quiet time has started, so their nap ends up being shorter than other kids. It just seems so cruel to wake children up because there is a schedule to follow. If it were my own centre and I could do it my way, I would allow children to wake up naturally, unless they really were sleeping too long. At the drop-in family resource centre where I worked for 8 years, if children were tired we took them out to their parents, so we never really had to deal with waking up children.

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I'm wondering if there is some other way to not wake them up. It sounds like you have to get your group outside. Why outside? Someone is cleaning the mats in your room, but why must they do all the mats right then? Is there someone outside with other kids? So you can send yours out one at a time as they wake? Or can you have your kids that woke up already, stay inside and you watch them as the others wake- don't make them stay quiet and probably they would end up waking the others a bit? Maybe with more details, we can figure out a different way. Do they have afternoon snacks as they wake? Can they do that in there while you are all waiting for the whole group to wake?...

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Thanks for your reply. Everything is on a tight schedule. The centre opens at 6:00 am, and the staff person who wipes down the mats is finished her shift once the mats are wiped down. Each of us has our own group of 8 children, and we rotate through all the rooms and take turns outside. If I stay in with the kids who are still sleeping, there is no one else to take the other kids outside, and if they joined another group, that teacher would have way more kids than is legal. My group has snack when we come back inside, and there are only 2 rooms where the kids can have snack, so we have to rotate all the groups through each room. The room where they nap is not set up for eating. There is no table and the floor is carpeted, and, I can't send some children to a different room to join another group to eat snack because that teacher would be over ratio. The space we have is not ideal. It is in a church with small Sunday School rooms, and the playground is not visible from those rooms. And the Sunday School rooms are upstairs, so I can't just send one child at a time outside. We also have to negotiate the parking lot before we get to the fenced in playground.

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I think I would start waking them a little earlier, so they're not so rushed, but not immediately flip on the lights. Open the blinds, start making a little noise....give them time to adjust. Like Michael said, start with the deep sleepers first.

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This is what I do, too.

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If they are ALL this hard to wake, can you speak to whoever has them in the morning and ask that they do down for rest time a little earlier?

I hate the rigid schedules and go by my littles cues. Some days we have early lunch/rest and other days we are later, or if everyone wakes up early we wake up and get going, if everyone is still sleeping we get more rest.

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How long do you generally allow for children to wake up?

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I usually try to have a window of 20 min. or so. I change diapers/potty break the ones already up and I wait until toddlers are standing to get them out. I would not blare music or be overly hyped, I understand the rush to get going but it's not working now and could be making for a bad wake up experience for the kids. I would also wake up earlier, especially if you have a schedule and they're taking a while to wake up. When I worked with getting kids up I would rub there back and say gently their name to coax them awake, then I'd give them a few to get their bearings, to sit up and not be so bleary eyed.

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I've tried gently waking each one up, but the staff person who wipes the mats gets annoyed with me when I do that. And several kids simply won't wake up until someone has them sit up. One little boy is only there every other week, because the week he lives with his dad he doesn't come to daycare. He always cries so hard when he wakes up, because he seems wake up expecting to be at home. I can't even have the children who are awake first go to the bathroom while waking up the other children, because the bathroom is down the hall, and obviously I can't send them unsupervised to the bathroom. There just doesn't seem to be time to gently wake up each child. I have half an hour to get them all awake, have them each put away their pillows and blankets, go down the hall to the bathroom, get jackets on and go outside. Heaven help me when I have to start applying sunscreen before going outside. The other staff seem to be able to do it, and I feel like there is something wrong with me because I don't know how to manage this. This isn't something that has been covered in any of my classes so far. I am great at planning sensory activities and open ended art activities and engaging children in conversation and making each child feel special. But waking them up from nap time, not so much.

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To be honest, if your coworker is that unhelpful, I would insist she help. That's what being coworkers is about. I honestly would be none to pleased and be very open in doing things 'my' way and if she doesn't like it, too bad. Then she can grumble and wait, I'm surprised she doesn't try to help you, I'm sure there is nothing barring her from doing so, like wiping up mats is her only responsibility in the place. I've had coworkers like this, they suck!

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Good point! If she's in the room wiping mats, you could take half the kids (the awake and alert ones) to the restroom while she stays with the ones still trying to wake up. If she doesn't like your way of waking them up, she can do it her way.

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She is in a hurry to wipe the mats because her shift is over half-an-hour after I get there. She said yesterday that she's going to show me a "tip" for getting the children up and moving, but I'm not at all sure how that's going to go. I am dreading going to work this afternoon, and I have to leave in 45 minutes.

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Yeah, they don't teach you this in classes. This is really where the director and staff have to plan and solve problems together. Having 8 children to yourself in a center doesn't work. You have to be a team because you cannot send one to a bathroom alone and have one eating snack and 6 half asleep and the 'wiper' standing around waiting to wipe lol. We really need tons of details here to help solve the problem. But j stead, solve it with those people that have all the details and the power to change things! The director and staff. Is here a sink your room? If so, they should be able to wake, wash hands, and eat snack (snack can be served on a kids table that seats 2-4, on a small plastic mat). The 'wiper lady' should be in the hall watching them go in to the bathroom (and they could wash hands there before snack if no sink in the room). There is no good reason to be forcing those kids to get up when they aren't ready. Timing can be changed, staff can be moved, mats can be wiped later that day, outside time can be done later, naps can start earlier. The whole plan needs to be revisited... Good luck today with wiper lady's tip!

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Just making sure I'm understanding. As soon as you go in, it's time for the children to wake up, and the other staff member in the room still has half an hour to work, and all she does is wipe 8 mats? For 30 minutes?

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No sink, no table. It's in the room down the hall. Everyone else is busy with their groups or going on van runs to pick up school-age children. I'm beginning to think that, even though I have a lot to learn still, part of the problem is with the way the centre is operated. The owners run 3 centres in my city, and everything has to run on schedule so it doesn't interfere with the next group. I'm just going to be working there until September, when I start my first practicum. I am not allowed to do my practicum at any centre where I've worked.

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No, she wipes the mats for all three groups of children. The children are supposed to put their own mats in the hall, and obviously they don't do that the minute they wake up. So the other staff person has about 15 minutes to wipe all the mats. I don't know what else she is supposed to do before the end of her shift.

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Just wanted to say I really appreciate everyone's replies and ideas. I guess I'll see how things go today, and I might have to talk to my supervisor about this and see what she has to say. I guess I haven't done that yet because I felt I shouldn't need help with this and that I should be able to figure it out on my own.

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Well, my co-worker basically told me to do the things I am already doing, like opening the blinds and turning on the lights. She put on a horrible radio station really loud. But I realized that I am not as assertive as she is in talking to each child to wake them up. The other thing she suggested for one little boy who is always difficult to wake up is to tell him it's time to wake up and that I'm going to help him to sit up. But then today everything was different again. Part of my group was napping in one room, and others were napping in another room. One group was already awake and my co-worker said she would wake up the group that was still sleeping, so I didn't get a chance to be more assertive and try out her tip for the extra sleepy little guy. I'm not going to learn if she doesn't give me the chance to do it. I guess I need to be more assertive with my co-worker too.

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How long do they get to sleep? I don't think this is anything you want to be learning! I think, if the nap isn't long enough, your instincts are correct in not feeling good about waking these kids up and playing obnoxious music and turning on lights. I think that's pretty disrespectful to the people you are supposed to be taking care of. Just because they are younger than us doesn't mean we can treat them with lack of concern for what their bodies want and need to be healthy. They need to rest. And they don't deserve to have this whole assault to their senses simply for doing what their bodies need, and what the teachers even told them to do (go to sleep!). That whole system really needs to be rearranged. the kids should be woken up if the nap is going on way too long, but it seems impossible to be the case if all of them are still asleep and so knocked out that none of them are getting up and at 'em fast. Usually some will wake up, some will be easy to wake, and maybe some sleep way over the ending time, but no, not all. It must be too short. When we do our ece classes, it's so easy! Then you go out into the real world. For everyone to be safe, healthy and happy (with as few staff as possible cause that's the reality!), you have to have a good plan and a good team. You have to continue to evaluate that plan and keep changing what needs changes. Do you have staff meetings there? Maybe you can suggest a new post nap plan at the next staff meeting?

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I would question whether or not they're getting a long enough nap. I have 23 children and I usually only have to wake up 1 or 2. Nap is over at 2:00 and almost all are up on their own between 1:50 and 2:10. If the majority are still sleeping and hard to wake, then they need more sleep.

Is there any way you could switch your snack time and outside time with someone else's so you have more time?

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I haven't been there very long yet, and have not yet been to a staff meeting. I would feel really stupid asking to change the nap routine, because none of the other teacher have problems waking up their groups. The children are supposed to go down for their quiet time at noon, after they've eaten lunch, or maybe it's 12:30, and I get there at 1:30, so maybe they aren't getting enough sleep. I know some children arrive in the middle of quiet time, and some children don't fall asleep right away. Our schedule has to work around the schedule of the school-age children, so we go outside with the preschool children while other staff are on van runs to get the kids from school. Then when the school age kids arrive they come to the playground, so we have to go inside. Then we go into the room where they do art for snack time because there is a sink and a table. We have 45 minutes for snack. Anyone who want's fruit from their lunch bag cut up, I cut it up for them. I also make sure the kids are eating their healthy snacks first. And there is one little girl who is waiting for an assessment who I sometimes practically have to feed myself. I have to keep coaxing bites into her mouth, and if she refuses to eat anything, her mom is all nice and friendly to me, but then goes and complains to another co-worker. After snack we go into another room for 45 minutes to play with play dough (often I make flubber and the kids love it!). I also have a couple of sensory bins that I've made (moon sand, and coloured rice with measuring cups, scoops and funnels). Then we go into the room with dramatic play stuff - a little house centre with stove and cupboards with food and toys. There's also dress up. After half an hour we merge groups and go to the block and puzzle room, and we are there until 5:30 pm when I go home. During that time we take turns vacuuming the building and washing the dishes. All the cleaning has to be done by 6 pm, because everyone else's shift ends at 6, so we end up vacuuming while parents are coming up the stairs to puck up their children, tracking dirt into the building. I don't know why they can't pay one staff person to stay to 6:30 to finish the cleaning. So yeah, as you can see, there is a very rigid schedule to stick to. I work at one of three locations run by the same couple, and nothing really seems to be child-centered or based on the needs of the children. I like the children, and the supervisor of my centre is really nice, but I definitely don't want to be there long term. Fairly often, for their "art time" after circle time they are given worksheets instead of a craft, or better yet, an open-ended art experience. They are only given a few minutes to finish their so-called "art." So maybe the problem is with the way they operate and not so much me. But I have to make the best of it until September when I start my first practicum. I'm already getting a 1$/hour raise, and I will be working 40 hours/week starting in May, and I really need the money. Plus this job allows me to get my 500 hours of work experience that I need in order to be a licensed ECE when I graduate. That's in addition to my practicum hours, and I have two semester-long practicums as well as a couple more classes, and then I'm done.

Sorry I went on for so long!

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The bathroom and the room where we have snack is down the hall. None of the rooms are big enough to accommodate sleeping children as well as children who are ready to eat snack.

In spite of all their crankiness after nap time, they are a sweet bunch of kids. One little girl tells me up to ten times in four hours that she "yuvs" me. Kids from the other groups always hug me when they see me, and ask to be in my group because I do things like make flubber and sensory bins.

I'm only going to be there through the end of August, and then I start my practicum and classes. So I may have to just suck it up. If I stay there until September I know I can get good references from them, because the director seems to think I am the answer to her prayers and that I can teach her staff the value of open-ended art and sensory bins.

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Well, there are two ways to deal with this: suck it up till you leave or try to get them to change. You will feel guilty the whole time if you suck it up- and that nap for less than one hour is absolutely too short. If you try to change things, you probably won't be heard- not by staff who have been sucking it up for so long that they get upset when people try to fix it. The other teachers probably already know "the value of open ended art" etc. But that type of child centered care makes their lives hell because how can they even wash hands? There are no sinks? And no one gets an aide. So they all have to go together from room to room doing one teacher directed activity at a time aye aye aye!

This place is all about the money. They staff as few as possible to keep in ratio (and probably are often out of ratio when one little thing goes awry). Is it legal to "wash" hands with baby wipes or hand sanitizer? If so, I would look into getting a tiny 2 child table and 2 chairs, cram it into the corner of the room and serve snack in there as they wake. Two at a time, maybe 3 or 4 if they fit. As they wake up, they can wipe hands with wipes and sit at the table. You make it very convenient: put crackers and strawberries on a paper towel or whatever. I realize you won't get to choose the snack but do it however you can to make it clean (now does this sound familiar- your coworkers have been struggling at this for months or years already and that's why they are doing things as clean as possible as well). As children one at a time wake up, you can wipe your own group's nap mats. Somewhere in your room you will need a secure place to store spray bottles for washing and disinfecting the table, paper towels, whatever you need for the nap mats. You will need cups and a pitcher of water (fill before kids go to sleep). The snack process will need a lot of planning and prep ahead of time since you will have zero help and sleeping kids. But once you have all your supplies organized in your room, with a good full supply you'll be fine (you'll be screwed if you run out of anything with no one to go get another). Once they have all woken up on their own, and all had a snack, I would take them all to the bathroom together. Everyone try. By now it will be 2:30 and the big kids will have taken over the outside play space (if I understand). So time for playing somewhere indoors with large motor activity. Set up anything you can- do you have those thick tumbling mats? Obstacle course over those would be safe. ...

These are just some ideas. Something can be done- a little at a time! Everyone is hesitant because they are probably afraid of making things more difficult. Get that tiny table and go from there! One day you'll be sitting in your tiny room with all of your children doing their own chosen activities (tiny dress up area, tiny art area- that table, tiny play kitchen) and you will love what you have accomplished. And then your practicum class will come up and you'll be like oh my gosh this is so easy and fun because working in a real center is super cray cray! August isn't very far off...

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Okay, I think I may have given somewhat of a skewed perception of the centre. I agree, they are all about the money and are very schedule-oriented rather than child centred. But there are 2 rooms that are set up for snack and have a large table on lino flooring and a sink for children to wash their hands. Children bring their own lunches and their own snacks.

There is one room set up for dramatic play, so children do get to do dress-up and play in the house centre as well. The other rooms have activities on shelves that they can choose as well, but the only sensory-type activity that is provided is play dough, so that is why I have brought in some of my own sensory bins. Also, even though the director of the centre thinks I have a lot to offer in terms of open-ended art activities, and wants me to lead by example, the way the centre is set up makes it virtually impossible. Children do not have access to art materials all day long the way they did at the family resource centre where I worked for 8 years. If the other staff have knowledge about sensory play and how to do sensory activities, they obviously don't do anything about it. And when I bring out my sensory bins I don't make the children participate. They are free to choose other activities as well, but they all want to play with my sensory bins because it's something new and exciting for them. I don't tell them how to play with the materials, I let them explore with their hands, measuring cups, funnels etc. Anyway, this is totally digressing from my original reason for posting this thread.

I'd be in mega trouble if just went ahead and did things in my own way and didn't get the children outside to play after their nap.

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It sounds like you have your plan: grin and bear it till august/September. sorry.

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No need to apologize. I did come on here looking for advice. If and when I have my own centre I will definitely not do things the way this daycare centre does.

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