Most bedtime advice starts at the bath. Bath, pajamas, teeth, story, lights out. It’s good advice, and it works, and if you already have a routine like that, keep it.
But often the routine isn’t the problem. The twenty minutes before it are.
What those twenty minutes usually look like
Somebody is still going. There’s a tower being built, or a show still on, or a sibling doing something far more interesting. Then a grown-up says, “Right, bath time.”
That’s a big ask. Winding down is a skill, and at three or four, it isn’t finished yet. What looks like refusing the bath is often just a child who hasn’t been given any runway.
First, the number you’re aiming at
It helps to know what you’re actually trying to get. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine’s consensus panel recommends that children aged three to five get 10 to 13 hours of sleep in 24 hours, including naps, and that children aged one to two get 11 to 14 hours (Paruthi et al., 2016).
Work backward from when your child has to be up. That gives you a bedtime, and the twenty minutes we’re talking about sit just before it.
Two things the research supports well
1. Doing the same thing in the same order
In a study of 405 families, researchers asked half to start a consistent three-step bedtime routine and left the other half as they were. After three weeks, the routine group’s children fell asleep faster and woke less often in the night, and their mothers reported better mood (Mindell et al., 2009). Nothing exotic was added. The routine itself was the change.
A later review of this literature reached the same conclusion and added a useful detail: the effect appears dose-dependent. Families who managed the routine on more nights of the week saw greater benefit than those who managed it occasionally (Mindell & Williamson, 2018). Five nights beats two. It doesn’t have to be seven.
2. Turning the lights down, and earlier than you think
This is the one that changed how I think about the wind-down because it’s measurable and specific to this age group.
Researchers gave preschoolers, average age just over four, one hour of bright light before their normal bedtime and measured the melatonin in their saliva. Melatonin fell by around 88 percent, and it was still suppressed 50 minutes after lights out (Akacem et al., 2018). The light level used was about 1000 lux, which is bright, but a well-lit kitchen or living room in the evening isn’t as far off that as you’d hope.
Young children are thought to be particularly sensitive to this because larger pupils and clearer lenses allow more light to reach the eye. Whatever the mechanism, the practical version is simple. Dimming the room is not a mood gesture. It is the most direct lever you have, and it works before bedtime rather than at it.
The runway
Put those two together, and the twenty minutes before the routine have a job: get the light down, and do it the same way every night.
- Lamps, not the big light. One overhead off is worth more than any amount of asking nicely.
- Bring the volume down, yours included.
- Move the play to the floor. Sitting is slower than standing.
- Put a song on, and let that be the thing that changes the mood instead of your voice.
That last one does more than it sounds like. A song is a signal that isn’t an instruction. Nobody is being told to calm down, which means nobody has to argue about it.
Why a song, specifically
Mostly because it’s a repeatable step, and repeatable steps are what the routine research keeps landing on. The song isn’t magic. It’s a marker, and markers are the mechanism.
There’s a softer reason too. Singing to settle a small child is about as widespread a human habit as exists, and researchers who study infant responses to music find that babies arrive ready to respond to it rather than having to learn how (Trehub, 2001). It’s a reason the habit is worth trying. It is not a result.
It also helps that a song has a shape. It starts, it goes somewhere, and it ends. A child who can hear the ending coming has something to hold on to, which is easier than an open-ended “we’re going to bed soon.”
Wisple’s songs are built for this stretch. They’re slow on purpose, and none of them has a big finish. Hush, Little Meadow is the one most families start with. Soft and Green is a breathing song where Wisple breathes slowly, and your little one tends to join in without being asked.
The screen question
Split this into two questions, because one has a clearer answer than the other.
The light part is not really in dispute. A bright screen held close to the face is a light source, and the melatonin work above applies to it. A review of studies in children under five also found more screen time generally associated with poorer sleep, including longer to fall asleep and less of it (Janssen et al., 2020). If a screen is in the wind-down, dim it, put it down on a surface rather than in their hands, and keep it out of the last stretch.
The content part is where I have to be straight with you. It feels obvious that a slow quiet song with a still picture is a different thing at bedtime than a loud, fast, brightly cut cartoon. I think it’s true. But I went looking for research establishing that pace and content matter more than simply how long the screen is on in this age group, and I didn’t find it. Treat that as a reasonable expectation, not a finding, including when we say it about our own videos.
Autoplay is the exception worth being firm about. If the point of these twenty minutes is that things slow down and then stop, a feature built to ensure nothing ever stops is working against you. Turn it off or use something that ends on its own.
A rough shape to try
None of this has to be exact.
- Twenty minutes out, the overhead light off and the volume down.
- Fifteen minutes out, a song on. The same one, most nights.
- Ten minutes out, on the floor with something quiet, lamps only.
- Then the routine you already have.
If it helps to have it on the wall, there’s a free Bedtime Step-by-Step chart. No email to hand over.
Where the evidence runs out
Three limits worth knowing, so you can weigh the advice yourself.
- The 2009 routine study examined children from about 7 months to 3 years, younger than many of the children we write for. The review covers a wider range, but treat the specific numbers as a direction rather than a promise.
- The light study is striking, and it’s on the right age group, but it’s small, with only ten children. Small studies point; they don’t settle.
- The screen findings are associations, not causes. Tired households use more screens, which muddies the picture in both directions.
The idea of treating the twenty minutes before the routine as part of the routine is our own extension of this work. It follows from it. It hasn’t been tested as such.
When it doesn’t work
Some evenings it won’t, and that’s not a sign you’ve done it wrong. A child who is overtired, coming down with something, or has had a very big day is going to be harder to settle, whatever you do. Protect the consistency, not the result on any one evening.
If your child’s sleep is worrying you rather than just tiring you, that’s a conversation for your pediatrician and not for a blog post. Persistent trouble falling asleep, loud snoring, long pauses in breathing, or sleep that isn’t improving with a steady routine are all worth raising with them.
Sources
We’d rather show our working than sound certain.
- Akacem, L. D., Wright, K. P., & LeBourgeois, M. K. (2018). Sensitivity of the circadian system to evening bright light in preschool-age children. Physiological Reports, 6(5), e13617. https://doi.org/10.14814/phy2.13617
- Janssen, X., Martin, A., Hughes, A. R., Hill, C. M., Kotronoulas, G., & Hesketh, K. R. (2020). Associations of screen time, sedentary time and physical activity with sleep in under 5s: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 49, 101226. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.smrv.2019.101226
- Mindell, J. A., Telofski, L. S., Wiegand, B., & Kurtz, E. S. (2009). A nightly bedtime routine: Impact on sleep in young children and maternal mood. Sleep, 32(5), 599–606. https://doi.org/10.1093/sleep/32.5.599
- Mindell, J. A., & Williamson, A. A. (2018). Benefits of a bedtime routine in young children: Sleep, development, and beyond. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 40, 93–108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.smrv.2017.10.007
- Paruthi, S., Brooks, L. J., D’Ambrosio, C., Hall, W. A., Kotagal, S., Lloyd, R. M., Malow, B. A., Maski, K., Nichols, C., Quan, S. F., Rosen, C. L., Troester, M. M., & Wise, M. S. (2016). Recommended amount of sleep for pediatric populations: A consensus statement of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 12(6), 785–786. https://doi.org/10.5664/jcsm.5866
- Trehub, S. E. (2001). Musical predispositions in infancy. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 930, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1749-6632.2001.tb05721.x
Plumble’s World is a calm, gentle media experience for children ages 2 to 5. It is not a therapeutic or clinical program, and it is not a substitute for advice from your pediatrician.