Night-Time Routines For Kids

This session introduces the concept of night-time routines and will complement and extend upon the lessons from the morning time routine session. Kids will learn the importance of a planned night-time routine and how to best set themselves up for success. They will also be given a guided calm breathing visualization that can be used to assist with falling asleep. By the end of the session, kids will be better equipped to have successful and stress-free nights.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to another session of mindfulness meditation and calm breathing for kids.

Why don't you take a seat,

Get nice and comfortable and take a big slow breath in through the nose and out through the mouth.

You ready?

Okay,

So in the last session we looked at how things were connected.

How the air we breathe is connected to the plants in nature.

We breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide and they breathe in carbon dioxide and breathe out oxygen.

It's all connected.

We looked at how our actions impact other people's actions.

If we share and be nice to people,

People are more likely to share and be nice to us.

We looked at the connection between what our mother or our father or our carers do for work and how those actions allow us to have the stuff that we need to live and to have fun,

Like our houses and our toys.

I also wanted to mention that the food that we eat is connected to our bodies.

Our body,

Whenever we put food into it,

It breaks it down,

Finds all the good nutrients and turns that into us.

The better food we eat,

The more healthy we will be.

The worse food we eat,

The less healthy we will be.

So it's always good to make sure that we're eating well and if you're not sure what good food is,

Ask your parents or your carers and they will tell you.

They'll say,

Hey,

This is a food that you probably should eat as much as possible,

But these are foods that maybe you should only have as a treat.

It's okay to have those treats,

But you can't be having them all the time.

And speaking of,

If you're not sure what good food is,

We're going to be talking about a nighttime routine.

Our morning time routine that we did a little bit earlier is connected to our nighttime routine.

If we set up our morning,

Our day will be successful.

We'll be happy.

We'll be calm.

We'll be able to play with all the things we want to play with.

Our day will be super good.

But then it comes to nighttime.

And if we have a good nighttime routine,

It'll make sure that we get to sleep on time and have a lovely sleep and then wake up feeling refreshed and ready to go.

So in the same way that we worked out our morning time routines,

Let's have a little talk about our nighttime routines.

I'm going to share with you what we do in my household.

And you could talk to the person sitting next to you and say,

Hey,

Let's work out what would work for us.

You might like to do what we do,

Or you'd probably want to work out what works best for you.

So we like to have dinner at the same time each night.

We all come home,

We sit down and we help prepare the table.

We get out all the cutlery and the plates.

We help get out the food and the drinks.

And we all sit down together and just have a little consideration and think about where the food came from.

You know,

Talking about how things are connected,

Food just doesn't appear.

Mummy,

Daddy,

Your carer,

Whoever's looking after you has to go out and work to get the money to get that food.

Then they have to go shopping and bring the food from the shops home.

But it doesn't stop there.

At the shops,

Those shops have to get the food from wherever they get the food from,

Maybe from a farm or a factory or some other place.

Sometimes it's interesting to have a look at the packages and just think about where our food came from.

Did it come from just down the road or did it come all the way from overseas?

So we set up the table together,

Have our food and just have a little think about where our food came from.

Then we eat our food and we chat and ask about how all of our days have went and we use our listening ears and listen in.

And when we're eating,

We make sure to pay super careful attention to our food.

We don't just hum-num-num scoff it down.

We take a slow,

Calm breath and eat our food mindfully.

That just means tasting it.

You know what?

Here's a little story about me with food.

When I was a little boy,

I thought mangoes were yuck.

I said to my mummy,

I'm not going to eat those at all.

And do you know what?

I'd never even tried one.

So after weeks and weeks,

My mum finally convinced me to have a little tiny taste.

And I begrudgingly did.

I'm like,

Ugh,

Okay.

I tasted the mango and do you know what?

It was my favourite fruit of all time.

I couldn't get enough of them.

So because I tried it,

Because I had a go,

Because I tasted it mindfully,

I was able to eat a mango for the first time and then I loved them.

Could you imagine what would have happened if I never tried that mango?

I still would think they're yucky and would never have had all of that deliciousness.

I wonder what foods you would secretly like if only you tried.

So at our family,

We set up the table,

We have our dinner,

We eat our food,

We have a nice chat and we try it all mindfully.

That means with an open mind,

We give it all a go.

We taste it.

Now,

If we don't like it,

That's okay.

We don't have to eat any more of it,

But we make sure to try it just to make sure,

Because that way we know.

Then after dinner,

We pack up all of our plates and cutlery,

Put it all into the sink and wipe down the table and then we start our bedtime routine.

We brush our teeth,

We go to the toilet,

We put on our pyjamas and our diapers and then we hop into bed.

We choose a book to read and we read a book together.

Maybe it's a picture book,

Maybe it's a comic,

Maybe it's a novel,

Who knows?

We see how we go.

And then we gently and calmly fall asleep.

Perhaps you want to work out a nighttime routine that will work for you and your family.

Maybe you like having a bath every night or maybe you prefer to have your showers and baths in the morning.

Whatever works for you,

Just take a little moment to think about it and then perhaps as a family,

You can work out the best way to have a routine at night.

The benefit of a routine is that it gets you sorted and everyone knows what's happening,

When and why.

Now,

Even though we have a routine,

Sometimes,

Some nights,

We can't get to sleep.

And when that happens,

We do a little bit of a nighttime meditation,

A calm breathing exercise.

I'm going to talk you through it now and you can do this on your own at any time you like.

You lay down in bed,

So go lay down.

You can lay down in your bed or just wherever you are right now,

Just to practice this one.

You lay down,

You get nice and comfy and you close your eyes and you take three big,

Slow breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth.

Nice and super slow,

We're not struggling and our eyes just stay closed.

You can move and adjust if you want to get comfortable.

You ready?

Let's do it.

Now,

We're struggling to fall asleep,

We just keep taking slow,

Calm breaths with our eyes closed and we just try and just drop our worry,

Drop our focus,

Stop caring about falling asleep.

We're just going to lay there,

We're just going to chill,

We're just going to do some slow,

Calm breathing.

Because did you know,

If you lay down with your eyes closed and do slow,

Calm breathing,

You almost get almost as much rest as you would if you were fully asleep.

So it's almost just as good.

So there's nothing to worry about.

But then when you're laying,

You're doing your slow,

Calm breaths,

You can do a little bit of a body scan.

You work your way up your body and you do slow,

Calm breaths and you just say to each part,

Relax.

And you just imagine it getting heavier and more relaxed again and again.

Let's do a little one of these now.

Close your eyes,

Take a few slow,

Calm breaths,

Lay down,

Enjoy your attention to your feet.

I want you to imagine that your feet are super relaxed and super heavy.

You can move around if you like,

But all of your body is going to get super relaxed and super heavy.

Move up to your legs,

Feel how your legs are feeling a bit more relaxed and super heavy.

Nice and calm.

Move up your body to your belly,

Your belly's feeling nice and relaxed.

And your chest,

Your chest is feeling nice and relaxed.

And your back,

Your back is feeling your back is feeling nice and relaxed.

And your arms,

Your arms are feeling nice and relaxed and super heavy.

And your neck,

Your neck's feeling super nice and relaxed and calm.

And your head,

Your head's feeling nice and relaxed and nice and calm.

And your eyelids are super relaxed and super heavy and super calm.

And now your whole body all at once.

Every single little bit from your fingers to your toes,

Super relaxed,

Super heavy,

Super calm,

Just feeling great.

And you just keep going through each part of your body,

Taking big slow breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth.

And just slowly,

Calmly focusing on each body part.

And if your breathing changes just to breathing through your nose,

That's okay.

If you feel your eyelids getting super heavy and you can't open them,

That's okay.

If you feel yourself drifting off to sleep,

That's okay.

All you're doing is just laying down and just looking at each of the different parts of your body and just encouraging them to relax.

Say,

Hey foot,

Relax.

Oh,

Hey foot,

You're feeling super heavy right now.

Hey chest,

You're super relaxed.

Just every single part of your body,

Nice and calm.

And you just keep going through that process,

Slowly breathing,

Eyes closed,

Going all the way up and down your body,

Again and again.

And remember,

Even if you don't fall asleep,

That's okay because your body is resting.

And that rest will help you to get ready for the next day.

Well done.

Okay.

So,

Take a big slow breath in through the nose,

Now through the mouth.

And if you have any questions about nighttime routines or relaxation body scans or anything in this session,

Ask the person next to you to ask me in the classroom and I'll answer you as soon as possible.

Have a great day.

You

Reviews

This was great (for me as an adult!) I wish I had this kind of support as a kid. Now I do🙏