As adults, we know the importance of sleep and how bad we feel when we don’t get enough of it. But kids don’t quite get this and are constantly engaged in a battle with their parents to be up later and sleep less. While giving in to them and letting them have the odd late night isn’t going to have a serious impact, consistently not getting enough sleep has been connected with a number of other problems as well as declining results at school. But are your kids getting enough sleep?
Importance of sleep on education
Everyone needs a different amount of sleep and the activities of the day can also have an effect on this. There are also two types of sleep – NREM and REM. NREM sleep, or non-rapid eye movement is also called quiet sleep and this is where the energy levels are restored, the body works on any repairs that are needed and the hormones controlling growth and development are sent out into the body. The other type, REM or rapid eye movement sleep is known as active sleep – this is the time when we dream and our brains are active but at the same time, our bodies are immobile with both breathing and heart rates being irregular.
A baby spends around half of their sleep times in each of these states and each sleep time is around 50 minutes long. By the age of six months, REM sleep accounts for around 30% of the sleep time and by preschool age, this sleep time reaches around 90 minutes at a time.
As a general rule, for the first two months of life, a baby needs anywhere from 10 to 18 hours sleep a night. From two to twelve months, this levels out to 14-15 hours and between one and three years, this falls to 12-14 hours. Once they reach three to five years, around 12 hours is about right while in junior school years from five to twelve, 10 or 11 hours will normally suffice.
Sleep becomes even more important when kids reach school age. A good night’s sleep ensures they can pay better attention at school, be more creative and even come up with new ideas in class. They will be better at solving problems and more sociable with other kids and adults. They can even fight off illness better. On the turn side, if they don’t sleep enough, they are liable to forget what they learn, be bad tempered and lack the energy to play games or sports. They won’t have any patience with others and their attention span will suffer.
Tips
One of the big tips for a good night sleep for younger kids is to have a good sleep routine. This means that kids know what to expect, what is going to happen and when they will be going to sleep. One example from the Sleep for Kids website is along the lines of:
Have supper, a light snack
Take a bath or shower then put in pyjamas or other sleepwear
Brush teeth
Read a story in a room that is quiet and at a comfortable temperature
Put the child into bed, say goodnight and leave the room
Repeat this routine each night and avoid watching TV or videos just before they go into the routine. This is shown to make going to sleep more difficult so ensure they do something non-stimulating before bed.
Don’t use bed as a negative, telling them they are going to bed if they don’t do or stop doing something – this makes going to bed a bad thing and will make them want to find ways not to do it. Also, try to show that everyone in the house is getting ready for bed as kids often want to stay up for fear of missing out on something. If they think everyone else is getting ready for bed, this can lessen the urge to find ways to stay downstairs and awake.
