Teens Are Getting More and More Tired

Teenagers who fall asleep in class might not just be bored, they might be fighting their biological clock. In fact, very few teens get eight to 10 hours of sleep daily, as recommended by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. More than two thirds of high school students sleep seven hours or less on school nights. That’s according to research highlighted in a recent policy statement by AASM.

Though some schools have made the shift, most start earlier around seven o’clock because of school busing schedules and after school activities. And teens are tired of it according to a poll taken at Arrowhead South Campus. Students took a simple poll provided by me asking if they liked the start times of school and all students who took the poll said school started way too early.

Jack Baumann, a freshmen at Arrowhead says, “I feel exhausted after my day at school, I have to wake up super early and go to school to get lectured in all sorts of classes and by the end of the day, I’m shot. I just want to go home and sleep.”

Another student, Morgan Konopka says, “I agree with Jack. I have to work a job, do a sport, and keep up with all my studying so I can’t get to sleep until around twelve o’clock every night. That’s only six hours of sleep and I heard we need at least eight or nine.”

When a kid becomes a teenager, they have a biological sleep change of about two hours. So instead of falling asleep at nine o’clock, they will not fall asleep until about eleven o’clock found in an article provided by http://www.nationwidechildrens.org/sleep-in-adolescents. That also means sleeping in an extra two hours. But with the early school times, kids aren’t getting enough sleep, which can lead to sleep deprivation. According to http://www.nationwidechildrens.org/sleep-in-adolescents, being sleep deprived can lead to a change in mood, cognative ability, behavior, acedemic preformance, and drowsy driving.

Sleep has the potential to boost teens overall performance in school and mood. Some people like to sleep and in their opinion, it would be good if they could get just a little more of it.