Advocate for a later start time for high schools. In one study, adolescents who transitioned from middle schools whose start time was 8:25 a.m. to a high school whose start time was 7:20 a.m. did not go to bed earlier (Carskadon, Wolfson, Acebo, Tzischinsky, & Seifer, 1998). As a result, they slept an hour less each night. In contrast, seven high schools in Minneapolis changed their start time from 7:15 a.m. to 8:40 a.m. Most students did not go to bed later, as some had feared, so they got 5 more hours of sleep per week (Wahlstrom, Davison, Choi, & Ross, 2001).
Changing the Cycle
Students with delayed sleep cycles, like Jay, can be gradually introduced to a healthier schedule by going to bed earlier in increments of 15–30 minutes over several weeks (Ollendick & Schroeder, 2003). Radical changes in sleep habits, as Jay attempted, are not as successful. For students with serious sleep problems, physicians or therapists might be enlisted to help with underlying medical, social, or emotional problems.
Parents and schools need to join forces to help students develop healthy sleep habits. If they do so, students' socioemotional well-being and academic achievement should improve, and educators' jobs should become easier.
References
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Buckhalt, J. A., El-Sheikh, M., Keller, P., & Kelly, R. J. (2009). Concurrent and longitudinal relations between children's sleep and cognitive functioning: The moderating role of parent education. Child Development, 80(3), 875–892.
Carskadon, M., & Dement, W. (2000). Normal human sleep. In M. Kryger, T. Roth, & W. Dement (Eds.), Principles and practice of sleep medicine (3rd ed., pp. 15–25). Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders.
Carskadon, M., Wolfson, A., Acebo, C., Tzischinsky, O., & Seifer, R. (1998). Adolescent sleep patterns, circadian timing, and sleepiness at transition to early school days. Sleep, 21(8), 871–881.
Dahl, R., & Lewin, D. (2002). Pathways to adolescent health: Sleep regulation and behavior. Journal of Adolescent Health, 31(6), 175–184.
Fredriksen, K., Rhodes, J., Reddy, R., & Way, N. (2004). Sleepless in Chicago: Tracking the effects of adolescent sleep loss during the middle school years. Child Development, 75(1), 84–95.
Horowitz, T., Cade, B., Wolfe, J., & Czeisler, C. (2003). Searching night and day: A dissociation of effects of circadian phase and time awake on visual selective attention and vigilance. Psychological Science, 14(6), 549–557.
Kahn, A., Van de Merckt, C., Rebauffat, E., Mozin, M., Sottiaux, M., Blum, D., et al. (1989). Sleep problems in healthy pre-adolescents. Pediatrics, 84(3), 542–546.
Ohayon, M., Carskadon, M. A., Guilleminault, C., & Vitiello, M. V. (2004). Meta-analysis of quantitative sleep parameters from childhood to old age in healthy individuals: Developing normative sleep values across the human lifespan. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 27(2), 1255–1273.
Ollendick, T., & Schroeder, C. (2003). Encyclopedia of clinical child and pediatric psychology. New York: Kluwer Academic.
Roehrs, T., & Roth, T. (2008). Caffeine: Sleep and daytime sleepiness. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 12, 153–162.
Sadeh, A., Gruber, R., & Raviv, A. (2003). The effects of sleep restriction and extension on school-age children: What a difference an hour makes. Child Development, 74(2), 444–455.
Snell, E. K., Adam, E. K., & Duncan, G. (2007). Sleep and the body mass index and overweight status of children and adolescents. Child Development, 78(1), 309–323.
Wahlstrom, K., Davison, M., Choi, J., & Ross, J. (2001). Minneapolis Public Schools start time study. University of Minnesota, Center for Applied Research and Educational Improvement. Available: www.cehd.umn.edu/carei/Reports/docs/SST-2001ES.pdf
Wolfson, A., & Carskadon, M. (1998). Sleep schedules and daytime functioning in adolescents. Child Development, 69(4), 875–887.
Originally published in the December 2009/January 2010 issue of Educational Leadership, 67(4), pp. 44–47.
A Place for Healthy Risk-Taking
by Laura Warner
At Francis W. Parker Charter Essential School, Wellness classes combine challenge and choice to help adolescent students grow.
Eating sushi. Talking with your parents about drugs or alcohol. Playing basketball. After each of these prompts, the students in my Wellness class rearrange themselves in a series of concentric circles that indicate their comfort level with the action described. I use this activity, called challenge circles, in the first week of school to set the stage for the coming year.
First, I create three concentric circles using ropes or cones on the floor. The inner circle is comfort, the middle is stretch or risk, and the outer circle is panic. Then I ask students to stand in the circle that represents their comfort level when asked to do a range of activities. We start off with relatively innocuous activities (eating pizza) and then ramp it up (talking with your parents about sex; telling a close friend you disagree with him or her). Finally, I connect it back to Wellness class and to physical activity using such prompts as running the mile for fitness testing or getting sweaty in class.
At the end of this activity, students have seen the wide range of comfort levels within our class. One student might feel completely at ease taking free throws but be sent right into the panic zone by something like swimming in the ocean. Playing soccer, with those hard balls flying through the air, is scary for many students, but it can be a place of true comfort for an athlete. Challenge circles are a great reminder for middle school students that what is true for them may not be true for their classmates.
Early adolescents are often described as developmentally egocentric, meaning that they struggle to differentiate between their own thoughts and the perspectives of others and often feel as though they are on stage, being constantly watched and judged by their peers. So seeing this visual demonstration of the differences in how their classmates perceive risk and comfort can be especially powerful. To debrief the circles activity, I ask questions like, Were we ever all standing in the same circle at the same time? What were some of the similarities or differences in our group? In which circle do you think the most learning occurs?
At Their Own Pace
Risk and challenge are an integral part of Wellness classes at the Francis W. Parker Charter Essential School in Devens, Massachusetts, where all 7th–10th graders attend these classes four days a week. We ask students to push themselves—to try new things that challenge their sense of comfort, but without the threat of actual harm. Our Wellness program includes an integrated curriculum combining aspects of health classes with physical education, games, and fitness. We offer a mixture of conventional games such as floor hockey and soccer and more unusual activities such as rock climbing, yoga, walks, and large-group tag.
The three full-time Wellness teachers frame activities so that students understand their range of options for participation and entry. When teaching middle school students to play football, for instance, I often remind them that they