If a baby and an adolescent are home for the holidays, adults will find one gets up too early and the other too late.
Studies continue to show a teen's biological clock ticks sleeping and waking times very differently for older adults and younger children. When a teen is on vacation, see if he or she prefers to stay up closer to midnight and to sleep in later each morning. This finding caused the American Academy of Pediatrics to call on school districts to move start times to 8:30 a.m. or later.
In the U.S., the National Center for Education Statistics found only 17% of public middle and high schools now reflect this natural pattern of teen sleeping schedules even though later start times reduce tardiness and absences. Teachers report students are less groggy and are more likely to engage in active discussions and make fewer mistakes in lab sciences, consistent with negative findings that sleep deprivation undermines learning and retention of new information. In one study, students who began school with a later start time received final grades that were slightly higher than those who began their school days earlier.
Changing the start times of middle and high schools does create problems. Administrations have to reschedule extracurricular activities and bus routes for lower and upper grades. Families also need to adjust to adults and students leaving at different times. And students who work after school or take care of younger siblings also are affected.
The earlier post, "Sleep Deprived Test Scores," suggested moving standardized tests to later times could improve scores and would have less impact on everyday school schedules. The post, "Big Projects Combat Climate Change," claims classes may need to shift to night time to avoid the heat of the day.
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