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Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

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Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#311

Post by JepZ »

> It may be time to tailor students’ class schedules to their natural biological rhythms...

Why does everybody want to change the world around them and not just adapt themselves to the world, e.g.:

'To earn better grades, students should sync their biological rhythm to their class schedules.'

While some might argue that it is not easy to do that, I would respond that such skill is invaluable for your life ahead. Granted, not every job requires such a skill, but many do.

From my own experience, I can tell that exercising discipline to go to bed early paid off for my work experience and there are few things I hate more than being tired at work: While work hours wear on, you are not getting done anything either.

Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#314

Post by danbolt »

jcoffland wrote: post #219
stephen_g wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly the kind of thing people with delayed sleep cycles hear all the time. There is a group of people for which your solution is impossible . Your circadian rhythm is compatible with that kind of schedule, and that's great. Some other people can't do that. I mean, I can wake up early regularly but eventually get into a sort of perpetual feeling just like jet-lag with symptoms of sleep deprivation (even whe…

Yep, it's just fate. Our genes determine our lives and there's nothing we can reasonable do about it. We're just leaves in the wind of life. Hard work will just make you feel bad so don't even try.

As I grew into the role of a young adult, I experimented and arranged school and/of work to be later in the day. Why not, especially as a “lazy” student, right? Funny enough, the quality of my work increased and I got better grades. I thought more critically in class and clearly when on the job. I didn’t need caffeine to function when I awoke or have to manage screen time before bed. I became a more productive person like the early birds, but in my own fashion.

It can be hard to read comments like this that paint the picture as learned helplessness, especially when it feels like honestly playing to one’s strengths.

Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#315

Post by learc83 »

jimmy1 wrote: post #189
btkramer9 wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do parents need to take their kids to school? I always walked to the school bus, no parents necessary

For some, a bus simply doesn't exist. For others, there is legitimate concerns over the safety of their children -- I would not feel comfortable leaving my kindergartener or first grader walk to a bus stop almost half a mile away at essentially the wee hours of the morning when it is still dark outside. If you are the kid who lives at the first stop, sometimes your bus time is as early as 5:55. I would never force my…

The bus system in most of the US really is terrible.

There is 1 adult to supervise 40 kids and drive a bus. I wasn't really bullied that much as a kid because I was always about a head taller than everyone else, but any bullying I did experience was on the bus.

Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#317

Post by matwood »

ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #213
projektir wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sleep in the dark I'm not sure what you're even trying to say. This is about chronotypes and a teenager-specific sleeping pattern that has been identified and studied. Sleep deprivation is torture, this is not my definition. Sorry, we, as a society, decided that not letting people sleep properly is really fucking crappy. If you want to disagree with that, take that up with the party that came up with the terms. Mes…

I don't know about this man... I get your point but it's a little over dramatic. My 13 year old girl lives with us half the time. Her other parent the other part of the time. They let her keep her phone with her all the time. She can completely skip sleeping entirely for more than 2 days when she has her phone all night, texting with friends. She's having fun, but then she crashes and burns HARD when she comes back t…

This. I mentioned up above that I've always been a morning person along with most of my friends. But, I didn't grow up with a device attached to me. Most of my activities growing up were outside. Going to school early meant more daylight after school to play. Even on weekends I was up with the sun, and often earlier since the surf was typically better early. All spring and summer we would be up at ~4:30am to go fishing. Kids staring at devices all hours of the day has had an enormous impact on their lives that I'm not sure we fully understand yet.

Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#318

Post by Symmetry »

matwood wrote: post #302
Symmetry wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are tons of lab experiments showing people's ability to learn goes down when they're sleep deprived. Memory consolidation seems to be one of the principle reasons sleep and given all the in-lab double blind studies it would be amazing if people getting less sleep didn't do worse in school. Which isn't to say that this particular paper or article proves that.

> There are tons of lab experiments showing people's ability to learn goes down when they're sleep deprived. I get that, but instead of immediately jumping to sleeping later maybe we should look at why kids appear to be going to bed later. All of the devices and distractions have likely pushed people to stay up later and later. Maybe the fix is not to move school times, but have parents take devices away at a reasona…

Generally speaking young children will tend to go to bed earlier and wake up earlier than their parents and adolescents will go to bed later and wake up later. It's true that electric lights and computer screens have exacerbated the problem of teenagers wanting to sleep in but they didn't cause them in the first place.

Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#319

Post by cma »

caust1c wrote: post #204
Grieverheart wrote: post #191

During college, I used to play WoW. I think my biological clock was messed up because of it, not because that was my natural biological rhythm. Also, because of the amount of hours I put into WoW, I did not have many hours left to study, affecting my academic performance. Thus, I wonder if the performance is really linked to the biological rhythm, or rather that the biological rhythm is a sign of activities impacting…

I'm with you there. I think the article is bullshit. We are in control of when we go to sleep, and ultimately that determines our circadian rhythm. Not some mysterious unknown force. The correlation with alcohol and drug abuse is a cause not a result. I was very much in the camp of playing video games all night long but I didn't kid myself about early class times being the cause for my struggle. * Disclaimer: IANA do…

There are plenty of studies on what night shift does to people who have a normal circadian rythym. It isn't pretty.

Re: Poor Grades Tied to Class Times That Don’t Match Our Biological Clocks

#320

Post by matwood »

JepZ wrote: post #311

> It may be time to tailor students’ class schedules to their natural biological rhythms... Why does everybody want to change the world around them and not just adapt themselves to the world, e.g.: 'To earn better grades, students should sync their biological rhythm to their class schedules.' While some might argue that it is not easy to do that, I would respond that such skill is invaluable for your life ahead. Gran…

But then when how will kids who play on their phones until 2am not be tired in class? /s
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