I’m sure you’ve heard all the noise in the news about
the importance of sleep. Maybe your parents have stuck some scientific study
under your nose. I’m also sure you're doing your best to ignore all this. I’m
going to try to change your mind.
Here’s a fact you might not have heard. Students who don't get enough sleep are often unable to remember what they learned the day
before. There’s a simple reason for this. While we sleep, information we picked
up that day is moved from our short term memory to our long term memory.
Without enough sleep, it goes into the recycle bin. You know what that means.
It’s thrown out with the trash.
One of my best students started to miss class. She
wasn’t ditching. She was ill. She hadn’t been sick much the year before, so I
became concerned. Her grades were suffering, but I was most alarmed because she
looked terrible. I asked if she'd seen a doctor. She had not. Then she told me she
was only getting about three hours of sleep each night. She stayed up to study.
I explained there’s a line; studying past that line has diminishing returns. It
would be far better to sleep nine hours, than to sleep less and study
more. Since her grades had fallen from A’s to C’s, she agreed to try my
suggestion. Two weeks later she felt fine, and her grades improved steadily.
Suggestion: Count backwards nine hours from when you
need to get up. Make that your bedtime. You’ll feel better, and your grades will
improve.
You are reading from the blog: http://www.roadtofreecollege.com
Photo Credit: Pixabay
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