Memminger Elementary program impressing on students that if they don't snooze, they lose
Grace Beahm
The Post and Courier
Anastasia Jones does her part to get enough sleep by taking a nap along with her 4-year-old kindergarten classmates Tuesday at Memminger Elementary.
The need for sleep
Recommended nightly hours of sleep:
3-5 years old: 11 to 13 hours
5-12 years old: 10 to 11 hours
Teenagers: 8 1/2 to 9 1/4 hours
National Sleep Foundation
Nathaniel Frasier puts his kindergartner to bed by 9 p.m. each night and wakes him up at 6:30 a.m. for school.
He thought his son was getting enough sleep and didn't realize until this week that recommendations call for up to an hour and a half more sleep than his son gets now.
"That's a big difference," he said. "I thought that was too much sleep."
Frasier signed a contract Tuesday promising he would move his son's bedtime up by an hour, and he's curious to see if it makes a difference. The bedtime contracts are a school-wide initiative at Memminger Elementary in Charleston to create awareness about the importance of sleep, and to encourage parents to set and enforce earlier bedtimes.
"I'll give it a try," Frasier said. "It's a good idea."
Children who don't get enough sleep are more likely to get in trouble in class or lose their focus on the day's lessons, and it's a problem for many Memminger Elementary students, principal Diane Ross said.
Some stay at work late with their parents and don't get home until 11 p.m., while others stay awake for hours watching TV in their beds, she said. When students get into middle school, some stay up late sending text messages on their cell phones, said Kathy Lewis, a school climate specialist working with Memminger Elementary.
The situation has implications for the school's test scores. Many students admitted to filling in random circles on high-stakes standardized tests because they were tired, Ross said. Students need more than one night of good sleep to be well-rested, she said, and that's why school officials have started pushing to change students' habits.
Research shows that many children don't get enough sleep. Children ages 3 to 5 get nearly 10 1/2 hours while they should average between 11 and 13 hours, and first- through fifth-graders get an average of 9 1/2 compared to the recommended 10 to 11 hours, according to the National Sleep Foundation.
"So many people don't realize fourth- and fifth-graders should be in bed by 8 p.m.," Lewis said.
Eighteen elementary schools on Johns Island, downtown Charleston, West Ashley and Hollywood are participating in this sleep initiative. Some are sending fliers home to parents, some are making presentations to PTA groups and others are asking students to track the amount of sleep they get each night.
Memminger Elementary has embraced the effort to spread the message that students need more sleep. Ross stood in a robe outside Memminger Elementary on Tuesday and asked parents whether they signed the bedtime contracts. Students wore their pajamas to school, and teachers organized classroom activities around the issue of sleep to emphasize its importance.
School officials plan to track the number of discipline referrals for the school's younger students to see whether the figures decrease when students get more sleep.
The school also held a meeting for parents Tuesday morning to talk more about the relationship of sleep to their childrens' well-being.
Jessica Rabon attended the parents' meeting. She has 5-year-old and 7-year-old daughters at Memminger, and she said they get grouchy and don't want to do their homework when they don't get enough sleep.
She's a stickler for bedtimes and makes sure her children are in bed by 7:30 p.m. and are going to sleep by 8 p.m. Every family should set bedtimes for children, she said.
"They need their sleep," she said.
Reach Diette Courrégé at dcourrege@postandcourier.com or 937-5546.
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Comments
This article has 16 comment(s)
Posted by afuller414 on March 20, 2008 at 12:57 a.m. (Suggest removal)
i am a high school student, and the recommended hours of sleep for someone my age is about 9 hours. how can we possibly get that many hours of sleep with school, still sitting down and having a meal with my family at dinner, and homework? i have about 3 hours of homework each night, i still have to help out with cleaning the dishes, and by that time, it's wayyyy past the time to go to bed to get those hours of recommended sleep time. with everything going on, it just isn't possible. for someone in elementary school it's even worse. 11-12 hours of sleep? if they have to get up at 6:30 for school, they would have to go to bed by 6:30.. some parents don't even get home from work until 6, and still have to cook dinner. although it'd be nice to get all those hours of sleep, it just isn't possible.
Posted by 5thGenerationLocal on March 20, 2008 at 7:23 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Are you crying? You kids have it way too easy these days. You don't even have to go to the library to research a paper. You can sit on your couch and surf the internet wirelessly nowadays.
It's called time management. How long do you think teachers are up? Remember, teachers are probably parents as well. So, with their having to get up early to feed, cloth and get the children off to school, they teach all day, then have PTA meetings, coach sports, and then back to parenting afterwards. Grading papers and whatever else they have to do... You don't too often hear of teachers complaining.
Buck up kid. It gets worse as you get older.
Posted by jca on March 20, 2008 at 7:44 a.m. (Suggest removal)
i agree with this actually. my son is 5 and goes to bed at 7:30pm on school nights
to the top comment its called starting homework as soon as you get home. stay of the pc chatrooms and instant messengers. teens have their priorities backwards. your social life is done on your weekend sat and sunday. the bedtimes are possible. when i was in high school i was in bed by 10pm. with all of my homework done. you have a study hall do some then. we did when i was in school
Posted by lillady on March 20, 2008 at 8 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I have to come back at this one. My 16 yr old daughter DOES stay out of chat rooms and starts her homework when she walks in the door at 4:30. With honors classes and a B average, no after school job, ect.. She has no time for anything. The homework "I" had in highschool compared to what they have now is night and day. Even my younger kids in elementary school... there is a ton more homework. BECAUSE of the fact they can do their research at home, I think the schools have made it harder. I am sorry but I have been there too many nights watching them try to get through all of the homework and I DO keep an eye on what they are doing. It's a different world now than when "we" were growing up.
Posted by johnwen on March 20, 2008 at 8:19 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Good thing he/she doesn't live on a farm :)
Posted by theronce on March 20, 2008 at 8:37 a.m. (Suggest removal)
From my mid teens to almost 50, I pretty much operated on 4 to 6 hours a day week days and week ends, work weeks and holiday weeks. Occassionally, I would crash for 8 or 9 hours. Anyway, I ditto the time management solution. There is no more or less time than ever. The tasks, required and desired, may have changed, but the solution is still the same. Don't whine; get cracking.
Posted by yougogirl78 on March 20, 2008 at 9:04 a.m. (Suggest removal)
JCA - How in the world do you get your 5 year old to bed that early? Please share your secrets :) I have a 5 and 3 year old that refuse to go to bed before 9pm. They are on a bedtime routine, but as they have gotten older it has been getting harder and harder. I agree with the article. If mine are in bed late, they are total grumpy heads the next morning. Good for Memminger for stepping up to the plate! Let's hope other schools in other counties join in.
Posted by halfsheli on March 20, 2008 at 9:56 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I think the schools would stick to academics and leave the rearing to the parents if more parents would step up to the plate. This incentive (not a law or edict) makes parents aware of the need that ELEMENTARY aged children have for sleep. The truth of the matter is -- for whatever reasons -- children are not getting enough sleep. In an ideal world where all parents did their jobs and made sure that their children were well-rested for school (which is the child's job) this would not be necessary. Certainly this is not aimed at parents who make sure their kids do what they need to do, but to those parents who either don't know or don't bother.
Posted by AHLeland on March 20, 2008 at 10:11 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I fear that this article and this program are not directed at any of us who are reading and commenting on it. This is for the parents who allow their young children to stay up too late. Exactly what is too late does vary from one child to another but the message they are trying to get out is that tired children are not as ready to learn and can be a distraction to the rest of the class. I think everyone can agree with that. I know that missing a few hours of sleep still makes me grumpy!
Posted by RTC on March 20, 2008 at 10:16 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Try getting a child to bed early that takes any type of medication for ADD or ADHD. Children that take a drug that is basically the same thing as speed don't go to sleep very well.
The teachers will complain the loudest, if the child doesn't take their medication.
Fortunately, I only had one child that was on this type of medicine. I swore that no child of mine would ever be on Ritalin, Adderall, or any of those drugs.
You change your tune when nothing else works, and the phone won't stop ringing, because your child can't pay attention, or is constantly talking or getting out of their seats.
They give your child tests, and then your child's doctor decides if your child needs medication. If you refuse to give these drugs then everyone's life becomes miserable.
These people need to realize that these drugs have bad side affects, and not all children can be programmed to go to sleep at a set time. It just doesn't work.
Posted by carogirl80 on March 20, 2008 at 10:24 a.m. (Suggest removal)
My elementary children are in bed by 7:30 each school night so they can be asleep by 8:00. We follow a routine. On non-school nights, they can stay up to 8:00 or 8:30. We have always stuck with a bed time. How can you not? Children thrive on routine and depend on it.
Whe I was in high school, which wasn't too long ago, I am sure I didn't get the recommended amount of sleep and I did fine in school. I think each family needs to keep the recommendations in mind, but decide what schedule will benefit them the best.
Posted by prosperous_hb on March 20, 2008 at 10:59 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Train a child while they are young, so that when they get old, they won't stray. If kids are taught the essence of sleep at a young age, they will understand the benefits of it when they get older.
Me personally, I can get by on 4 - 6 hours of sleep.
Posted by prosperous_hb on March 20, 2008 at 1:55 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Trying playing Madden on the Wii. It's awesome with a capital A!!
Posted by GG on March 20, 2008 at 4:59 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Cold Beer-
The article clearly states that children 3-5 years of age need 10-13 hours of sleep. It doesn't recommend that for all ages.
Posted by mnbvcxz on March 20, 2008 at 9:02 p.m. (Suggest removal)
ravenel gets 10 months, then parish should get 10 decades...
Posted by DanniD on March 20, 2008 at 9:58 p.m. (Suggest removal)
cold beer, that is very funny!!! I love it. The sad thing is that your story is probably true for some households.