The daily morning battle…

Children’s adult life depends on what we as adults decide for them today.

Millions of schoolers have to wake up early every day to go to school. It is a battle every morning for them and their parents. 

Sleep deprivation in kids and teenagers as a result of early school start has been a topic of concern and debate for nearly two decades. 

It is not laziness!

Research findings show that teens’ inability to get out of bed before 08:00 is a matter of human biology, not a matter of attitude. The sleep patterns of brain depend on the age. Due to the biology of human development, the sleep mechanism in kids and teens does not allow the brain to naturally awaken before about 08:00. This gets into conflict with school schedules worldwide.

The human brain has a marked shift in its sleep/wake pattern. At puberty, humans experience a delay of sleep timing in the brain. As a result, sleep patterns of children enabled them to rise early and be ready to be concentrated and motivated for learning.

In teens, the secretion of melatonin, the sleep hormone, begins at about 22:45 and continues until about 08:00. What this means is that teenagers are unable to fall asleep until melatonin secretion begins and they are not able to awaken until the melatonin secretion stops.

These changes in the sleep/wake pattern of teens are dramatic and beyond their control.

Expecting teens to go to bed earlier is not a solution. The sleep requirement for teenagers is between 8-10 hours per night. That indicates that the earliest healthy wake-up time for teens should not be before 07:00. Studies on sleep in general, and on sleep in teens in particular, have revealed the serious negative consequences of lack of adequate sleep. Teens who are sleep-deprived – defined as obtaining less than 8 hours per night – are significantly more likely to use cigarettes, drugs and alcohol. The incidence of depression among teens significantly rises with less than nine hours of sleep. Feelings of sadness and hopelessness increase from 20 % up to nearly 50 % in teens who sleep 4 hours or less per night.

Results from schools that switched to a late start time are encouraging: teens’ use of drugs, cigarettes, and alcohol decline and their academic performance improves significantly with later start time.