 Sleep, rest and relaxation. Not for you, silly. You're a parent. For your kids. Sleep, rest and relaxation are a forgotten luxury for most parents of young children, but from birth onwards they're a necessity for all kids, vital to their physical, neurological, social and emotional development. This video helps families and carers understand why and demonstrates best practices on how to meet your child's individual sleep needs. We've just finished a comprehensive early years sleep study conducted by the Department of Education and Training and Queensland University of Technology. Sleep is critical for their physical and their emotional well-being. I think it's really important for their brain development. They don't have good sleep. They will be cranky all day. Sleep is vital for children's learning, development and behaviour. At a time of rapid transition, it provides an important opportunity for young minds and bodies to recuperate. But you think they're busy when they're awake. You should think about when they're asleep too because when they're asleep they are consolidating or remembering what they learnt during the day and they're growing too. I think it would probably be good for 10 to 12 hours. 9 to 10 hours. 13 hours I'd say. I think it's supposed to be about 12. I don't think we've ever made it to 12 hours. The range in which children sleep varies enormously and we need to understand that children have a different range of sleep needs. That's why we advise not to compare your child's sleep needs with the development needs of others. And that can be tricky, but just know that there is a huge range of what's considered normal. Sleep is restorative for children. And it's also a life school where we learn to have rest and relaxation during our day. But for children, of course, remember that there's a changing sleep pattern and so we have to attend to their changing sleep needs. Oh no, I think it's definitely trial and error. It's just trial and error. Trial and error? No matter how you picked up putting your child down, there are some best practice techniques we recommend following. To maximise sleep, we recommend rest. Rest stands for regularity, environment, sleep need and transition. Routine and regularity is really important for children's sleep, rest and relaxation and very important for ongoing sleep development. But you do need to attend to children's individual sleep cues. Some cues are universal, but every child's different and so you need to learn to read your own child's cues. For example, perhaps they seek comfort and more attention when they're feeling tired or not. Environments are important too and what is preferable is that we have cool, calm, quiet and darkened environments. This isn't always possible, but it's preferable. It's important to support your child's learning and choices about sleep also. Older children may benefit from being involved in decisions about their sleep. Seizing the sleep moment is really important and it's important to have those transitions that signal in the routine that it's time for sleep. Timing is critical. Yeah, we've developed our own little routine. Storybook reading, dimming the lights. Do the bath routine, we brush his teeth. Tell them a bedtime story, then go to sleep. If it's a daytime sleep, it would be a book or two or three. Particularly for younger children, we need to attend to safety. Make sure that bedding, clothing and the external environment comply with the SIDS guidelines. Try to maintain your child's current sleep routines wherever they are and whoever they're with. Today's modern lifestyle means many families rely on multiple carers across their week. That's why communication is key. Regular two-way communication between you and the other people caring for your child are important. To maintain that routine that you've worked so hard to establish. Regularity of sleep patterns are important but remember patterns are changing quickly at this time so ongoing communication with the carers is critical. Today, many children participate in early childhood education and care programs and these programs are typically busier social and learning environments. Your professionally trained educator also needs to adhere to national standards and quality practices. So sometimes this can mean that practices at the service are different to those at home. To help families and educators work in partnership, we've put together another short video. It identifies communication strategies to achieve continuity and maximise your child's sleep needs. We hope this video hasn't made you not off but we hope it helps your child too.