Sleep affects kids in school; how much do yours need?

In today’s world, technology is the biggest sleep robber of your kids which most of them use. Nancy Collop, president-elect of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine says Cell phones, Facebook, videogames, ipods etc. are the biggest culprits, which keeps them up till late night. As the new school year has begun, the biggest concern of the parents is to put their kids back on the right sleep track. It is seen that if parents follow healthy sleep habits then the kids automatically are well rested, and ideally they should cultivate the good sleep “hygiene” in babyhood. 

Affect of sleep on school performance

Dozens of studies were presented at the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) annual meeting in June, indicating the decline in school performance due to student’s sleepiness in the school. 

Rosen, associate director of the Sleep Disorders Program at Children’s Hospital Boston says that the cognitive development and the physical and emotional well being of a child are hampered due to insufficient sleep. Around 25% of children have some type of sleep problem whether difficulty in falling asleep, night waking leading to more serious sleep disorders. 

According to AASM, more than one third of elementary school kids and 40% of adolescents suffer from significant sleep complaints. Collop, the mom of two teenagers says that more than 5% of children are sleep deprived due to serious sleep disorders, simply go to bed too late and get up too early to compensate the hours they need to concentrate in school. Even they feel emotionally stable and play sports well.

According to the reports of the poll conducted by the National Sleep Foundation, the teens are at the high risk of insufficient sleep, and one in five adolescent gets an optimal nine hours of sleep on school nights. As a result, at the end of the week the high school seniors are deprived of nearly 12 hours of sleep. Risk of this sleeplessness is beyond the classroom, Rosen says that according to the study in “The Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine”, 15% of students had at least one car crash due to sleepiness as the main cause. 

Some behavioral strategies can be helpful in tracking back the healthy sleep cycle of the kids, says sleep experts.

Collop says that the technology should be out of the kids’ bedroom, no TV, no cellphone, no computer. The room should be just for sleeping. Light exposure from the TV screens suppresses the release of melatonin necessary to maintain the circadian rhythms. 

Subtle transition is a good choice

Alon Avidan, associate director of the Sleep Disorders Center at UCLA, says that the best way to track back the sleep timetable is to set bedtime half an hour earlier. Just setting the bedtime earlier and earlier would not help but to get up half an hour earlier will reform your kids sleep regimen within few days as the start of school nears.