This book studies and reveals perspectives on sleep from very young children (ages 2–5) and their parents. Employing interviews with children and their mothers, as well as photo elicitation, Scherer amplifies children’s own voices on how sleep is managed in their homes. Research participants were recruited from The Beyond Sleep Training Project, a large Facebook group of more than 180,000 members who approach children’s sleep with the aim to respond to their nighttime needs for comfort, safety, and nourishment as they would during the day. Topics covered include the history of infant sleep and sleep training, family sleep set-ups and routines, and competition and support amongst mothers discussing sleep on and offline. The book also outlines the research methodology used for interviewing very young children.

Lexie Scherer is Senior Lecturer in Childhood Studies in the Department of Education, Languages and Linguistics, University of Portsmouth, UK. Her research interests include participative methods, and research around young children‘s sleep. Her previous book, Children, Literacy and Ethnicity (2016), was shortlisted for the Philip Abrams Memorial Prize.