Anyone who has teenage children or who is a teenager themselves will know that biological sleep patterns shift toward later times for both sleeping and waking during adolescence. This means that for many getting up in the morning for school can be quite a challenge.
UK researchers are currently studying school start times to see what impact they have on exam grades.
"A major investigation is being launched at 100 secondary schools in the UK to establish if a later starting time for lessons of 10am will help boost GCSE grades.
The move follows an experiment at a state secondary school, Monkseaton in North Tyneside, which saw the percentage of pupils getting top-grade GCSEs – including maths and English – rise from 34 per cent to 50 per cent when a later start was introduced.
The change was most marked among disadvantaged pupils, whose performance rose from 19 per cent to 43 per cent.
“Recent advances in our understanding of the neuroscience of sleep has shown that the body clock of teenagers is delayed,” said Professor Russell Foster, from Oxford University.
“Our project will be the first... to explore whether a later start to the school day, along with educational programmes regarding the importance of sleep, will have a positive impact upon both academic performance and overall health in the teenage population,” he said.
As part of the research, 31,800 pupils taking part will be split into four groups at their schools. One will carry on with the normal schedule, a second will receive an education package on the importance of sleep, the third will start later in their GCSE year and the fourth will receive the sleep education package and start later in their GCSE year.
The aim is to find out which method is the most effective in producing good exam results.
Professor Colin Espie, also from Oxford University, added: “We know something funny sometimes happens when you’re a teenager. You seem to be slightly out of sync with the rest of the world.
“Of course, your parents think that’s probably because you’re lazy and opinionated and if you only got to bed earlier at night, you’d be able to get up in the morning.
“What we’re doing in the study is exploring the possibility that If we actually delay the school start time until 10am instead of 9am or earlier, that additional hour – taken as a dose over the course of a year – will actually improve learning, performance, attainment and – in the end – school leaving qualifications.”
www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/experiment-will-show-whether-teenagers-perfor... Should the schooling system stick to its current operating hours irrespective of the ages and stages of development of its students, after all this is the time frame most will need to fit with upon entering the workplace, or would it be beneficial to alter the school day to accommodate shifts in sleep patterns?
What do you think?
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