Sleep training involves getting your baby/child into the habit of falling asleep independently without any kind of outside help/assistance. This process varies for every child, even among siblings. When most moms hear about sleep training, they first think of the cry-it-out method. You can use several ways to achieve independent sleep in your child. Despite popular opinion, there is no perfect sleep training method. The ideal approach is the one that works for your family.

In honor of the student sleep health week (an event organized by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) to create an awareness of the importance of sleep in students of all ages), I hosted a webinar titled “getting our kids’ sleep on track. With the COVID pandemic and so many other societal demands, our children are not getting the adequate sleep they need. While insufficient sleep has been a long-standing issue, this added stressor has made things worse even before the pandemic. 20 to 40 % of young children have sleep problems, 58% of middle schoolers and 73% of high school students aren’t getting the recommended hours of sleep they need. Insufficient sleep takes its toll on our kids’ mood, learning, emotional and physical performance.

Restful sleep encompasses sleep quantity, sleep quality, and sleep continuity. The national sleep foundation provides recommended guidelines for the appropriate number of sleep hours based on age. In this video, we discuss how to achieve restful sleep by focusing not just on hours of sleep but on other important aspects.