Rewards to sleep through the night

[MamaMom]

Our daugther is two and is starting to understand reasoning but we thought it might help speed the process to sleep through the night on her own if she got a reward. She's big on rewards! Any suggestions? Tx

[lilbsmama]

why is it that you are trying to push her to do something that is not normal?

[InMediasRes]

I don't know if I would count sleeping through the night as something that could even be rewarded, since it's not something the child really has control over. There are lots of things that kids wake for in the middle of the night, like thirst, having to pee, feeling lonely, having nightmares, etc. Rewarding her for not coming to get you if she has one of these needs is like telling her to ignore the need, in my opinion.

If you wanted to reward staying in her bed or room all night, then it might work, although the reward has to be more important to her than what she would do instead (like sleep in your bed, etc.). And of course, you would have to be open to the idea that it might not work sometimes. I think at 2 that might be a little hard to understand. She might get it closer to 3, but she may be sleeping through on her own by then anyway.

FWIW, my DS is 2.5, and just about the crappiest sleeper ever. He's mostly sleepng through now. You might not have long to wait!

[3tammuz]

We reward our kids for sleeping through the night, BUT each one has his/her own rules. The rules are based on needs, age and personality. For my oldest, he is allowed one trip to the bathroom with a parent tucking him back in. After that he can get up to use the bathroom, but he only gets kiss goodnight/tucks himself in. For #2: she generally sleeps most of the night, but wakes up when the rooster crows, so for her, it is reading the clock and not waking us/everyone else up until after 6 am.

We give a small piece of candy (i.e., one M and M) or something small and tangible (i.e., sticker, play tattoo). The sticker chart works with the older kids, but not the 2-3 year olds.

[StrawberryFields]

We do it with our 3 year old and it works for us. Obviously if he needs to get up and use the bathroom or something that doesn't count against him. We use rewards to encourage him to roll over and go back to sleep when he wakes rather than calling out, switching bedrooms, etc. etc.

My SIL has a 2 year old and she uses a sticker chart with so many stickers equaling a toy. We just do a little treat with breakfast--yesterday was ice cream waffles.