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California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

qz.com

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Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#111
post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The benefits are sleep, as the article says. I would guess this outweighs the risk that a few students use the opportunity to stay up longer. (although pre 8am seems excessively early to me - we started around 8:50) > I'm particularly concerned that this will incentivize students to just stay up later, negating many benefits of increased sleep. This is missing the point. Teenagers staying up late is often interpreted…

I'm familiar with delayed sleep phase syndrome, is that what you are referring to? You state that it's a symptom of abnormal circadian rhythm, which as far as I know is greatly affected by light exposure. If students are awake later, using their phones/computers, won't that negatively affect their socially acceptable circadian rhythm? I agree that staying up late shouldn't be considered being lazy or disobedient, but…

Not abnormal, maybe a bad choice of phrasing there. Rather that during puberty people need more sleep and their rhythm shifts forward. This is exacerbated by poor sleep hygiene (eg screen use), but in general teenagers get tired later on than their parents.

Hence suggesting that kids will just stay up later is missing the point. The stereotype that kids stay up late partially arises becuase they have shifted circadian rhythms and they can't help it, not that they want to take advantage of later school starts.

And so the benefits of later starts are important becuase it more naturally fits with teenage sleep patterns.

For more info: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/19546564/

> Adolescents continue to show a delayed circadian (or internal clock) phase as indicated by daily endocrine rhythms even after several weeks of regulated schedules that allow for sufficient sleep. This delay is maintained under controlled laboratory conditions in which there is limited possibility for social influence

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been confused by TV shows showing kids leaving for school and it's bright outside with the whole family awake. Growing up, it was dark when we got up for school and just barely sun up (depending on the season still dark) by the time we left to get on the bus.

The simple answer is that TV shows are easier to watch if the events take place in the daytime. That's where the suspension of disbelief comes in.

That's true, but even for example, I've cartoons with the same thing.

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#114

Unfortunately, the school systems still rely on one parent at home. It is not just drop off and pick up times: school activities, parent-teacher conferences, etc. For example, in the SF Unified District, school tours for parents of kids entering kindergarten, middle school and high school are during the school hours, mostly in the morning. It is all built around the expectation of a parent at home or a job structure…

8am or later start probably has more to do with kids being sufficiently awake, an important state when attending school.

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#116
post #55

Wonderful. Now can we pay attention to all of the research saying that homework creates stress but doesn't work, and have schools stop assigning so much? More precisely, the research shows that homework done right helps, done wrong hurts, and the result is that more homework increases the correlation between parent's socioeconomic status and student performance. But on average is approximately net neutral for learnin…

FWIW my 5-year-old started kindergarten this year, and not only is he given about two hours of homework a week (expected to be spread out over a few days), but he is expected to do it without parental help/supervision, beyond getting him started/explaining the assignment (because he can't read).

If you've ever been around a 5-year-old boy, you know how ridiculous this is.

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#117
post #114

Unfortunately, the school systems still rely on one parent at home. It is not just drop off and pick up times: school activities, parent-teacher conferences, etc. For example, in the SF Unified District, school tours for parents of kids entering kindergarten, middle school and high school are during the school hours, mostly in the morning. It is all built around the expectation of a parent at home or a job structure…

8am or later start probably has more to do with kids being sufficiently awake, an important state when attending school.

Kids put properly to bed at proper time is more than fresh at 7. Thats the least of the problems here.

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#118

Unfortunately, the school systems still rely on one parent at home. It is not just drop off and pick up times: school activities, parent-teacher conferences, etc. For example, in the SF Unified District, school tours for parents of kids entering kindergarten, middle school and high school are during the school hours, mostly in the morning. It is all built around the expectation of a parent at home or a job structure…

This is dependent upon the school system. My school board has parent-teacher interviews during the daytime and evening as well as school tours for parents of students entering kindergarten in the evening. If only one parent is available in the evenings, the school I work at is typically prepared to put the students to work as helpers so that adults can do their stuff. The only thing that is scheduled during the daytime is a school day in June for incoming kindergarten students, which is supposed to make school less traumatic when they start the following September. This was the norm in my school day, in a distant time and a distant land ...

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can tell you that, through most of the bay area at least, those policies are mostly about intentional socioeconomic segregation. My family has deep ties to local education infrastructure and its well known that most of the advocates for these policies are trying to keep poor kids out of their schools. While they don't say it in public forums they're generally more than happy to tell you in private.

You are claiming that poor parents will changed their school choice based on the availability of parent-teacher conferences? And that the problem of poverty is overemployment, not underemployment?

Poor parents often don't have a choice: they can't afford to take time off from their job(s).

Re: California’s new law bans schools from starting before 8am

#120

Unfortunately, the school systems still rely on one parent at home. It is not just drop off and pick up times: school activities, parent-teacher conferences, etc. For example, in the SF Unified District, school tours for parents of kids entering kindergarten, middle school and high school are during the school hours, mostly in the morning. It is all built around the expectation of a parent at home or a job structure…

I can tell you that, through most of the bay area at least, those policies are mostly about intentional socioeconomic segregation. My family has deep ties to local education infrastructure and its well known that most of the advocates for these policies are trying to keep poor kids out of their schools. While they don't say it in public forums they're generally more than happy to tell you in private.

Every year I see what a insurmountable advantage my kid has by having educated, comfortably well off parents. He's in 3rd grade and last week he had a homework assignment that had to be completed on a computer. What, your kid doesn't have their own computer at home? Tough luck!

We're also already into 'projects' - more hours of work, more resources to buy. "oh you can do it with stuff around the house" (no you can't)

No one wants to talk about it and it infuriates me. There are kids who are just out of the running from the moment they enter kindergarten, and everyone is going to blame their parents or their 'culture' and refuse to see what's right in front of them.

There is no more 'public' education, only middle-income private education. It's a disgrace.

edit: raspberry pi

A lot of middle class parents I know would spend 10 minutes trying to understand the raspberry pi site and give up. HN tends to vastly overestimate people's technical skills. For poor parents with no tech background - forget it.

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