Weird behavior

Question
Hi, thanks in advance.  I have a 14 month old english bulldog.  He is house trained for the most part.  I have 2 questions, semi related.  1- he still has to sleep in his kennel that i used to house train him.  He wont sleep anywhere else, he rips beds that ive bought and prefers the kennel, thats not a problem.  The problem is that i still have to lock the kennel because he would go in the house without a problem.  He wont do it during the day, and when we are gone he would try his best to hold it.  However at night, he has no problem going, without warning.  During the day i have to take him out often, its guess work, he wont tell me when he has to go, he just holds it until i take him out.  How can i teach him to give me a signal? The second question is this.  He sleeps with me in my room, inside his locked kennel, but he has to to every morning at 6 am.  I get back from work a bit past midnight, therefore i dont wake up until 8 am.  This becomes a bit stressful because i barely get 6 hours of sleep and i have to wake up to take him out, then i have trouble going back to sleep.  My wife doesnt feed him anything at all past 4 pm.  And she puts him to bed at 10pm everynight, but she makes sure that he goes before bed and he always does.  Still he has to wake up at 6am to go, then he goes right back to sleep until 10 am.  How can i make him not go so early?  He is not a puppy anymore, if he goes at 10 pm, he shouldnt have to go again at 6 am, and thats all he wants, because right after he is taken outside to go, he comes back in and sleeps sometimes past 10 am.  Please help.

Answer
Take the dog out when you get home from work at midnight.  He has been inadvertently "trained" to need to be taken out at 6AM.  There's no reason he can't be "trained", slowly, to make that time out 8AM.  Take him out again when you get home from work, reward and praise his elimination, put him back in his crate.  If he begins to whine at or around 6AM (dogs can't tell time but the slant of light and other cues alert them), IGNORE IT for as many days as it will take for him to stop (be persistent, it could take a week or more.)  Since you know he has eliminated at or around midnight, you won't feel guilt or any need to take him out earlier than your normal wake up time.  If you find that you can't readjust his schedule without guilt or worry, and/or if he does waken at the usual hour of 6AM and interrupts your sleep for longer than you can manage, move his crate out of your room.  It's obviously highly unlikely that this dog will eliminate in his crate, or he would be doing it already.  He's more than able at his age to go ten hours overnight.  Dogs repeat behaviors that are rewarded.  Be certain water is removed (unless it's very, very hot or the dog has had an unusually stressful day) by 8PM.  If you take him out around midnight, this should be sufficient.