The School Morning Doesn’t Start in the Morning

The sun rises, the sun sets. The seasons change. The tides move. The moon waxes and wanes. Nature is full of rhythm.

Our own biology is rhythmic too. We sleep and wake. Cortisol and melatonin follow daily patterns. Body temperature changes across the day. Hunger, digestion, alertness and sleepiness all have rhythms.

So why would we expect a developing child to thrive on spontaneity or, in some cases, complete unpredictability?

The last-minute dash

The last-minute dash for school shoes because apparently their feet grew two sizes during August. The uniform bought the day before school starts. Bedtime at 8pm becoming 8:45pm because:

“Just ONE more story…”

…And then another. And another. And before you know it, it is 7:43am the following morning and you are standing at the bottom of the stairs holding one shoe, shouting:

“If you come down right now, I promise we can get a treat after School”

By 7:52am, you have promised a treat, extra screen time and possibly a small pony!

This is where routine becomes important when going back to school. Routine isn’t about having an organised kitchen or colour-coded lunchboxes. It is about predictability. And for a developing nervous system, predictability is important.

Children can benefit from routine

This isn’t simply something parents say because they would quite like everyone to put their shoes in the same place.

A 2024 systematic review examined 170 studies investigating routines and child development. Overall, routines were associated with positive outcomes across areas including self-regulation, social-emotional development, cognitive development, academic skills, and mental and physical health. The review also found evidence suggesting routines may be particularly protective for children living in challenging or higher-risk environments. [Selman SB, et al, 2024]

Interestingly, when researchers examined social and emotional outcomes, 23 of the 24 studies reviewed reported positive associations with routines.  That does not prove that simply introducing ‘Taco Tuesday’ will transform your child’s moods. Much of this research is observational, so we need to be careful about claiming cause and effect.

But taken together, there is a fairly compelling message that predictable patterns in family life matter.

“One more book, pleeeeze”

Bedtime may be one of the best examples. You have read the book. You have found the missing teddy. You have provided water. They have been to the toilet. You’ve kissed them goodnight. And then:

“One more story?”   You say no.

Your partner walks in.  “Pleeeeease. Mummy said I could.”

Mummy absolutely did not say they could. Dad reads another story.

Now bedtime is 25 minutes later and, perhaps more importantly, the child has just discovered that

“No” doesn’t necessarily mean no.

It might mean,

• ask again
• cry
• negotiate
• ask the other parent
• wait five minutes
• feel mysteriously thirsty

Children are remarkably good ‘negotiators’. They repeat ‘experiments’ that produce ‘interesting’ results.

Studies of bedtime routines have been shown to have many benefits

In a large international study involving 10,085 children aged 0–5, having a consistent bedtime routine was associated with earlier bedtimes, falling asleep more quickly, fewer night wakings and longer sleep duration. There was also evidence of a dose-response relationship: the more consistently families followed the routine, the better the sleep outcomes tended to be. [Mindell JA et al., 2015]

Another study following 468 children found that greater bedtime-routine consistency predicted fewer night wakings and fewer reported sleep problems over time. [Fiese BH et al., 2021]

Research involving preschool children (small study of 50 families) has also found associations between better bedtime routines and measures of executive functioning, including attention, inhibition, working memory and cognitive flexibility. [Kitsaras G et al., 2018]

So that familiar sequence:

1. bath
2. pyjamas
3. teeth
4. book
5. cuddle
6. bed

may look incredibly ordinary, but ordinary does not mean insignificant.

The repeated sequence tells a child’s brain: ‘We have done this before. I know what comes next,’ and that is safety. Safety means better health too.

Predictability also reduces the number of battles you have to ‘fight’

Imagine two mornings.

Morning One

• “What do you want for breakfast?”  “I don’t know.”
• “Cereal?” “No.”
• “Eggs?” “No.”
• “Toast?” “Maybe.”

You make toast. “I don’t want toast.”

Meanwhile:

• “Where’s your PE kit?” “I don’t know.”
• “Where are your shoes?” “I don’t know.”
• “Have you brushed your teeth?” “No.”
• “WHY NOT?”

And now everybody’s nervous system is ‘scrambled’.

Morning Two

• The bag was packed last night.
• The uniform is out.
• Shoes live by the door.
• There are two school-day breakfast choices.
• The child knows the sequence: Wake, then wash, then dress, eat breakfast, brush teeth, get the bag, put on the shoes, and off you go.

We are not claiming Morning Two will resemble a John Lewis advert. (Just in case you were feeling a tad ‘not good enough’ parent). Someone will still announce at 8:06am that they need three rolls of toilet paper and a Harry Potter costume for school.

Routine doesn’t eliminate life. It removes some of the unnecessary chaos and brings predictability, which brings harmony.

Routine and boundaries

A boundary is not: “You will do exactly what I say because I am the parent.”

That is not what we mean. Nor does a healthy boundary require becoming cold, controlling or dictatorial.

A child can be disappointed by a boundary while still feeling loved within it. You can say:

“I know you really want another story. We have finished stories for tonight. We can choose one tomorrow.”

They may not like that answer; they may cry; they may protest. They may tell you that every other child in year 4 or grade 5 gets seventeen bedtime stories and stays awake until midnight (seriously).

However, the purpose of a boundary isn’t to ensure your child is delighted with it. Sometimes our job as parents is to tolerate their disappointment without immediately making the uncomfortable feeling disappear.

That is very different from being unkind.

Sometimes it is the parent who struggles with the boundary

Give yourself some compassion. Sometimes you give in because you are exhausted. Sometimes because you feel guilty. Perhaps you have worked all day and bedtime is the only proper time you have had together.

Perhaps saying ‘no’ brings up something in you. Perhaps you don’t like seeing your child upset.

Perhaps one parent says no and the other parent finds it much harder to tolerate the tears. Or perhaps you want some peace. Hence, “One more book?” becomes another book.

“Five more minutes?” becomes twenty.

“Can I have the iPad?” becomes “Fine, but ONLY for ten minutes.”

And somewhere along the way the child learns: A boundary is where the negotiation begins.

This isn’t about blaming you or parents, for that matter. It is about awareness. And boundaries require regulation from the adult too.

Consistency, predictability, and follow-through

There are three important elements when creating structure for young children:

Consistency, predictability and follow-through.

In other words:

• Respond in a reasonably consistent way
• Help children know what is likely to happen next
• And when you say something will happen, follow through. [5]

This last bullet point matters.

If bedtime is 8pm every night, except when someone protests strongly enough, then 8pm isn’t really the boundary. The protest has become part of the routine.

Routine does not mean rigidity

This distinction is important because routine provides a framework, whereas rigidity prioritises rules over relationships.

Life requires flexibility, because there will be birthday parties, late trains, grandparents, holidays, illnesses, and sleepovers (more like wake-overs). Family dinners that run late. And evenings when everybody gets home exhausted, scrambled eggs on toast is basically nutritional medicine.

A family with routine isn’t a family where nothing ever goes wrong. It is a family with enough underlying structure to accommodate the exceptions.

Think of rhythm rather than military precision.

Yes means yes. No means no. And sometimes the answer can change.

There is another reason boundaries in childhood matter. You are not only teaching children how to get to school on time and being consistent, you are also teaching them something about words, limits and relationships.

If I say yes, I mean yes.

If I say no, I mean no.

And if circumstances genuinely change, I can explain why I have changed my mind. This distinction matters. One day the person setting the boundary won’t be Mum or Dad.

It will be them.

• “No, I don’t want to.”
• “No, I’m not comfortable with that.”
• “No, you can’t borrow that.”
• “No, I don’t want another drink.”
• “No, I don’t want to be touched.”
• “No, I can’t take on another piece of work.”
• “No, that doesn’t work for me.”

At the New School, we spend quite some time in Psychological Coaching teaching students how to establish boundaries. Did you learn healthy boundaries when you were a child? Or were they more like rules?

A child who learns that another person’s “no” deserves respect is also learning that their own no deserves respect. These are key life skills. Life skills that some adults struggle with.

Routine can also create independence

Eventually, we can remove ourselves from parts of them.

At first:

• “Go and get dressed.”
• “Now brush your teeth.”
• “Where’s your bag?”
• “Get your shoes.”
• “Have you got your water bottle?”

But eventually the sequence becomes theirs. Wake. Wash. Dress. Breakfast. Teeth. Bag. Shoes. Vamos.

Children then start to organise themselves. These are everyday life skills. We are effectively lending children our executive functioning while theirs is developing. And gradually, we hand over more of the job.

The school morning doesn’t start in the morning

If mornings in your house are consistently chaotic, don’t only look at 7:30am. Look upstream (as we call it in functional medicine). What happened at 9pm the night before?

• Was the bag packed?
• Was the uniform ready?
• Did everyone know what breakfast was going to be?
• Were the shoes where shoes theoretically live?
• Was bedtime late?
• Did a child go to sleep already overtired?

A successful school morning often begins the night before. And a successful bedtime often begins long before somebody announces: “Right. Bed. Now!”

In summary, think rhythm, not rigid rules

You do not need a laminated family timetable. Seriously, you may laugh, but you would be surprised.

And you sure don’t need to reorganise your house after watching somebody else’s immaculate morning routine on Instagram.

Start with a few anchors:

• A reasonably consistent waking time
• Meals at broadly predictable times
• A familiar after-school rhythm
• School things prepared the night before
• A bedtime sequence
• A broadly consistent bedtime
• Clear boundaries around what happens once bedtime begins
• And plenty of flexibility for life

Maybe routine has had bad PR. It may sound boring, restrictive, or something that organised people do, who are boring. But remember….

If nature itself operates through rhythms of activity and rest, light and darkness. Don’t children? For more on Back to School support, read our blog on Back to school with nutrition education and coaching tips HERE

And as the children head back to school, perhaps you’ve been thinking about adding some learning back into your own life too. A new chapter. A change of direction. Or finally studying something you’ve been curious about for years, Nutrition Medicine, Psychological Coaching with some Rapid Relief Homeopathy.

Our next intakeat the New School of Nutritional Medicine is now open, with limited spaces remaining. Perhaps this September, it’s your turn to go back to school too.

Applications are open. We start Sept 19th. 

APPLY NOW 

To health!