Ryan

Expos. 3.

As I wake up to the pestering buzzer of my alarm clock, I am in complete darkness. I stare at the clock and it says 6:30 am. But I am not farmer Joe and I don’t plan to start milking the cows at the crack of dawn. I stumble out of my bed and prepare myself for another day in high school in a complete daze. Many adults would respond to this with sarcastic "poor baby!" But, while my parents are waking up at 5am to commute to work, they don’t realize how different teenagers are. Beginning classes even just a half-hour later would be beneficial to teenagers. It has been proven that growing teenager’s sleep patterns change and they are in need of more sleep. Grades would improve and students would be more active in class. Most importantly, school would be more enjoyable for teens if they could walk into school awake, alert, and prepared to learn.

Many see a teen sleeping during class as lazy. The fact is, is that a teenager can’t help but drool on the desk at such an early hour in the morning. Many chemical changes occur in a teenager’s body. Teenagers are in need of about nine and half-hours of sleep each night. However, only fifteen percent of teenagers get close to this many hours of rest. Puberty also delays the sleep cycle, which results in a teen’s ability to stay more alert later but become sleepier in the morning. I usually stay up till twelve am or 1 am because I can’t fall asleep anyway. This essentially means that teenagers go to school when their brains are still asleep. This means most of the brain ineffectively stores information and experiences of the day, making it harder to remember. Teenagers have a lot of demands. With homework, practice and jobs, teenagers need sleep to rest their exhausted bodies.

The lack of sleep can be harmful to teenagers. Within an hour of chemistry class at 8 in the morning, my attention span is shot. Add this with sleepiness and I’ve lost my attention span. Sleep deprivation can lead to poor grades and troubled concentration in the classroom. Eventually irritability, anxiety, depression, decreased creativity, and negative moods result in long term sleep deprivation. The negative moods can then reflect on the teacher. Sleepiness has also been found to be one of the causes of behavioral problems. The lack of sleep among teenagers also results in the use of caffeine. Coffee, caffeine pills, and many other drinks are used among teenagers everyday to help wake them up. But in fact, they are causing more problems by using caffeine because it is addictive, causes restlessness and severe health problems, and has numerous withdrawal symptoms. A teenager wouldn’t have to rely on caffeine if they were given the chance to get a good night’s sleep. Additionally, drowsy teens can be harmed if they choose to drive in the morning. It has been reported that over 100,000 sleepy drivers cause traffic accidents each year. Sleep deprivation is more harmful than you may think.

Most importantly, school would be more enjoyable for students if it began later in the day. For me, the most depressing moment of the day is when I hear my alarm clock and see nothing but darkness outside. A few schools have pushed back their start times back and many continue to follow their examples. Students at these schools were found to be more alert and ready to learn, rather than stumbling around in a zombie-like state until the afternoon. For example, I find it difficult learn when I’m tired and tend to zone-out. Then I fall behind the rest of the class and do poorly on quizzes and exams. The number of dropouts decreased with these changes as well. Attendance also increased and test grades rose with later start times.

High School’s today require teenagers to learn when they’re brain’s physically are unable to. Teenagers are in need of more sleep as a result of biological changes in the body and the lack of sleep can cause great harm to them. The delay in school start times would also make school more pleasurable for teens. So next time you see zombie-like students around the hallways, understand that they can’t help it; it’s nature.