how to help your child adapt

The beginning of spring brings its share of milestones: global warming, the budding of trees and the promise of summer. Perhaps even more welcome, it marks the start of Daylight Savings Time, commonly referred to as the “leap forward,” when much of the Northern Hemisphere will advance its clocks one hour. In the United States this year, daylight saving time will begin at 2 a.m. on Sunday, March 12.

Although they gain an hour of daylight, parents often dread these changes, which can upset nap and bedtime routines. But with an understanding of how the time change affects sleep and a little planning, you can make the transition easier for your family.

Why do we have summer time anyway?

Daylight saving time was first observed in Germany in 1916, with the aim of reducing wartime energy costs by better synchronizing daytime activities with natural daylight hours. It was adopted universally in the United States following the passage of the Uniform Time Act of 1966; although states were allowed to opt out, only Arizona and Hawaii chose to do so. Today, about 70 countries observe daylight saving time during the summer months.

These time shifts are analogous to a jet lag hour. But although there is a rule of thumb that it takes a day to adjust to an hour of jet lag, it can take longer and side effects such as nighttime awakenings can occur with even modest jet lags.

What are the consequences of sleep for children and adults?

Anxious parents often wonder how these time changes will affect their children’s sleep (and therefore their own). There is little research on this topic in children. In general, teenagers – or anyone who needs an alarm clock to wake up in the morning – will have a hard time getting ahead, while young children (and their parents) will have a harder time going backwards.

What happens when you “get ahead”?

The start of DST is going to be tough for anyone struggling to get out of bed in the morning due to losing an hour of sleep. If you’ve ever needed an alarm clock to wake you up in the morning, this one is a pain.

For teenagers, it is especially difficult to make this adjustment. First because they lose an hour of sleep. Second, and even more important, is because it forces them to shift their sleep period by an hour earlier. It is always more difficult to go to bed earlier than to stay up a little later. One way to solve this problem is to wake your child an hour earlier on Sunday morning, which will slightly increase his sleep debt and help him fall asleep easier that night.

If you have younger children who get up early, “getting ahead” can be a definite benefit as their apparent wake-up time will be an hour later. So if your child usually wakes up at 5:30 a.m. and you’re not happy about it, just wait until the clocks “go forward” and he magically starts getting up at 6:30 a.m. also go to bed at a later time.

Back to home

The start of daylight saving time can cause sleep problems for parents and children. Making a few modest changes to your child’s sleep schedule ahead of time can help soften the blow.

This story was originally published March 6, 2020 in NYT Parenting.

Craig Canapari, MD, is an assistant professor of pediatrics at Yale University, director of the Pediatric Sleep Center at Yale-New Haven Hospital, and author of “It’s Never Too Late to Sleep Train.” He blogs about sleeping problems in children on his website.