As the saying goes: "Spring sleepiness, autumn and summer napping", now it is spring, everyone is prone to fatigue and sleepiness, and the demand for sleep will also increase. Especially for children in the developmental period, it is particularly important to sleep well and sleep well.
The pictures in this article are all derived from the network, and the pictures and texts are irrelevant
How much do you know about your child's sleep?
Children's sleep duration is not up to standard, and it has become the norm
According to the Sleep Guidelines of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, the standard sleep duration for adolescents aged 0 to 18 years is:
Infants and young children aged 4 to 12 months need to sleep for 12 to 16 hours a day; children aged 1 to 3 need 11 to 14 hours; children aged 3 to 5 years old need 10 to 13 hours; children aged 6 to 12 years old need to sleep for 9 to 12 hours; 13 to 18 years old children need to sleep 8 to 10 hours.
However, in real life, most children do not sleep up to standard, and the older the child, the less sleep time.
The "2019 White Paper on China's Adolescent and Children's Sleep Index" mentions a set of data:
About 62.9% of teenagers on the mainland sleep less than 8 hours a day, and junior and senior high school students account for the largest proportion, about 81.2%.
Sleep deprivation is a lot of hidden dangers, especially in spring
Long-term lack of sleep, the harm should also be known to everyone, such as decreased immunity, emotional instability, low learning efficiency, difficulty concentrating, affecting physical development and so on.
Especially now in the spring, it was originally the "golden period" of the child's height development, the height growth value was equivalent to 2 to 2.5 times that of the autumn, and the amount of growth hormone secreted was more, if the child did not make up for it in sleep, it would not be a pity.
I know the importance of sleep, but there are still many children who are sleep-deprived, why is this?
Poor sleep habits can also delay your child's sleep
The objective factors that affect children's sleep are generally understood by everyone, such as learning pressure, especially middle and high school students, in order to improve their grades, every second must be competed for, which is bound to sacrifice sleep time.
Another point that people often overlook is that some habits before falling asleep often delay the quality and duration of children's sleep. In particular, the following things, try to avoid:
1. Indulge in electronic products before going to bed
"Mom, I'll watch another episode of the cartoon (TV series)""
"It's still early, ask a friend to play another round!"
note! These bedtime habits may be ruining your child.
Studies have found that nearly half of adolescents with poor sleep will be exposed to televisions, mobile phones or tablets before going to bed. These electronic products are "stealing" children's sleep.
The experience of "playing mobile phone before going to bed, the more you play, the more awake you are" must have been felt by many people. A survey in the United States showed that playing with the mobile phone for 8 minutes before bedtime will make the brain continue to be excited for 1 hour.
This is because in this process, the blue light emitted by electronic products will inhibit the synthesis of melatonin in the body, and melatonin is a hormone that induces sleep, which can help you relax before going to bed and quickly enter a sleep state.
And whether it is a game or a TELEVISION, the sound and picture inside will cause certain stimulation to the child's vision and hearing, so that its brain is in a state of excitement, and it is naturally difficult to fall asleep.
2, eat too much before going to bed
Many parents are worried that their developing children will not have enough to eat, so they will give them extra meals before going to bed, which is actually redundant.
First, eating too much, the more blood supply the stomach and intestines need, resulting in a decrease in the blood supply to the brain, which will actually affect the development of the brain. And it may also inhibit the normal physiological functions of the intelligent areas of the brain, such as language, thinking, imagination, etc., for a long time, but it is easy to affect intellectual development.
Second, eating too much before going to bed will cause a burden on the child's gastrointestinal tract, making the gastrointestinal peristalsis slower, the amount of blood oxygen supplied to the brain is shunted by the stomach and intestines, and the pituitary gland secretes less growth hormone, which may also affect the child's height development.
3. Vigorous exercise before going to bed
Generally half an hour before going to bed, do some gentle and soothing exercises, which help to relax the muscles of the whole body and play a certain role in helping sleep.
It is not recommended to do strenuous exercise before going to bed, which is also easy to make the nerves become hyperactive, the adrenaline rushes, the child often has difficulty falling asleep, and the next day the body muscles are also prone to soreness, affecting the mental state, but the gain is not worth the loss.
In addition to this, there is one thing to note:
Try to avoid sleeping with the night light on for a long time, which may lead to a decrease in the secretion of melatonin in the child's pineal gland, which in turn weakens the inhibition of the gonadal axis and induces precocious puberty, which is also easy to compress the child's development space, resulting in its growth is not high.
The best time for your child to rest
Expert advice: If you want your child to grow taller and develop better, it is best to go to bed before 9:30 p.m. and get up again around 7 a.m.
This work and rest time is more scientific, on the one hand, it can ensure that the child sleeps enough, the next day is energetic, and the learning efficiency is higher; on the other hand, it will not miss the peak period of growth hormone secretion (11 pm to 1 am, 5 am to 7 am), which can help the child grow into a tall.
However, growth hormone is generally only available after deep sleep, usually half an hour or an hour after the child goes to bed.
【Small survey】What time does your child generally go to bed at night? How many hours a day?