Did you know that sleep deprivation is considered a form of torture condemned by the United Nations? Poor sleep hygiene is associated with learning difficulties, mental health problems and cardiovascular disease. World health experts recommend elementary aged children get between 9 to 12 hours of sleep a night for optimal health. Yet some of our students are coming to Canyon with less than half of that. At school, being under slept can make it more difficult to learn and mimic some ADHD symptoms. Consistently poor sleep can increase vulnerability to depression and anxiety.
Sleep hygiene refers to the habits and practices conducive to a good night’s sleep - have a read through the suggestions attached, Sleep Hygiene for Children, to see if you can add some of these to your family’s routine.
At Canyon, some children have told us that one of the biggest causes of late nights and little sleep is video games. Because video games and social media can be highly addictive, elementary aged children may struggle to regulate use on their own and shut their devices off at the end of the day. Keeping screens out of bedrooms by establishing a designated screen area at home, and setting the family wifi to shut down at bedtime will help. You can do this by using the timer function on your router- or if it doesn’t come with one, you can purchase a cheap plug in timer to do the job. There are some great tips here on setting boundaries with screen time at home https://www.webmd.com/parenting/features/kids-screen-time
If your child is struggling to put their screen away at the end of the day or your child is experiencing anxiety at night time, please reach out - and I would be happy to work with you and your family.
