Sleep - The key to helping students flourish

In February 2023, Liam Cullinan, Executive Principal at NAS Abu Dhabi went to a presentation for parents about the importance of sleep. Mary Carskadon, a renowned sleep expert, challenged school principals to recognise and respond to the fact that kids need way more sleep than they were getting.  

Cullinan, who happened to be opening Nord Anglia’s newest school in the Middle East that autumn, took it to heart, embraced the challenge, and created a flexible school day model.  

At Nord Anglia International School Abu Dhabi, the school day starts at 8:20, more than an hour later than other private schools in the area. Parents can drop kids off at 7:15 for a morning enrichment programme, during which students can focus on their wellbeing and do yoga, sports, or have breakfast or study. But kids can also stay home and sleep a bit more. 

A whopping 60 percent of parents bring their kids in for the later start time. 

“It’s been really embraced by parents of early years and our teens,” Cullinan said. “They want their kids to get a rest, and teenagers also want to lay in”.  

The problem 

Sleep is the glue that holds us together, U.S. psychologist Lisa Damour likes to say. 

But while we all know lack of sleep makes us grumpier, it’s also critical to emotional resiliency, memory and cognition, better immunity and physiological health. 

And yet few parents know exactly how much sleep kids need, and not enough young people get the sleep they need.  

According to the National Sleep Foundation, school-aged kids (6-12) need 9-12 hours and teens need 8-10 hours a night until they are 18. Kids have variable needs like adults, which is why these are all ranges. 

Research shows that over half of middle school students and over 70 percent of high school students do not get the 8-12 hours of sleep they need. At a time when many are worried about teen mental health, sleep is the low hanging fruit: chronic sleep loss, Lewis says, exacerbates depression, anxiety and even suicidality.  

This is not a message that many school cultures send. “There's been this cultural sense that sleep is for the weak, for lack of a better term,” says Lisa L. Lewis, a U.S. journalist and author of The Sleep Deprived Teen: Why Our Teenagers Are So Tired, and How Parents and Schools Can Help Them Thrive. “It's ridiculous—it’s like bragging about how little air you need.”  

The challenge for many families is that teens sleep differently than adults. Their brains release melatonin, which makes them feel sleepy, later than adults, meaning they don’t feel tired until later. They often stay on devices until late at night, which stimulates their brains more, making sleep even harder. When they have to get up early for school, they often seem like zombies.  

“Within our secondary, I noticed our kids weren't getting into the flow of learning until after breaktime,” Cullinan says. While many schools try to put “key” subjects like maths or English at the start of the day when kids are fresh, a better option for teens might be later in the morning when they are actually alert.  

What happens when we sleep 

When we sleep, our brains do the active, critical work of restoring, repairing and recharging. It’s when we consolidate information and move it from short-term memory to long-term memory, where it can be accessed again later. Sleep helps strengthen essential connections between complex regions of the brain. Teen brains undergo a major remodelling in puberty, and that growth and remodelling requires energy. As a result, they need more sleep than adults—and more than adults realise.  

Teachers and administrators see the effects of tired kids all day. “Academic success in many of our schools is the norm and it’s hard for some students to get to the mindset of ‘it’s 10 pm, that's it, I will get some sleep,’” says Simon Higham, Principal at the British Vietnamese International School, Ho Chi Minh City. But he is adamant it’s necessary.  

“It’s as important as regular exercise, a good balanced diet, and the love and care you show,” he says.

Fact 1: Lack of sleep negatively impacts learning. It seriously messes with memory, processing information, attention and problem-solving, all of which are key to learning. If you shortchange sleep, you shortchange your ability to retain information, undermining your hard work.  

Fact 2: Professional athletes know sleep is a competitive advantage. Cheri Mah, head of Restorative Sleep at Stanford, did an innovative study on the Stanford men’s basketball team, looking at sleep and performance. Before the study, the players averaged less than seven hours a night. Researchers asked them to stay in bed for at least 10 hours. After they were fully rested vs. sleep deprived, players increased their successful free throws by 9%, three pointers by 9%, and they had faster sprint times.  

Fact 3: Policy makers are acting on science that says teens need more sleep. In 2019, California passed a first-of-its-kind minimum start time law, saying middle school could not start before 8 a.m. and high school before 8:30 a.m. (with a three-year phase-in). In 2023 Florida passed a similar bill. 

What parents can do to help 

Too often sleep gets squeezed out of the schedule for more academics, more sports, or more extracurriculars. Parents play a key role in making it a top priority.  

First, start early, when kids are young and parents can better establish and enforce them.  

“We can easily spot the kids who have routines and kids who don't,” says Higham from the British Vietnamese International School. “At 10 a.m. some find it hard to keep their eyes open.” But, he said, when those kids start getting on a healthy routine of going to bed early, their learning transforms. 

“What we find is that when parents adhere to bedtime routines and refine them to meet their needs you see a difference in attainment and attitude and general happiness and overall well-being in school.” 

Teens can be tricker. They are often loath to take our advice and building “bedtime routines” is simply unrealistic. Instead, first try presenting the facts. Simply say, “I care about you—your mental health and your performance, and sleep will help with both of these.” Ultimately any routine will be self-driven, so make it a conversation not a showdown.  

Finally, encourage what Lisa L. Lewis calls “wind-down routines”: 

Disconnect from all tech. That means phones out of bedrooms. And helping teens get off all tech one hour before (if possible). Screens stimulate the brain, and the content is often addictive and thus hard to put away. All of this impedes winding down. 

Identify calming activities, such as reading, listening to a podcast, yoga, colouring, or listening to music.  

What if your teen likes to watch TV on their devices before bed, say reruns of Friends? If they are getting enough sleep, it’s fine. If they are not, change up the viewing patterns. 

As parents, we spend a lot of time trying to help our kids succeed by studying more and encouraging sports and extracurriculars. Maybe it’s time to also focus on simply helping our kids sleep more. As Lewis says, “There's not one single thing you do better as a result of being sleep deprived.