Coping skills are very important for a healthy development of a child. Every parent tries to put in best of the efforts to ensure that their child does well in school, mixes up well with other children, has good concentration ability, is not moody, and is very healthy. If there were some product available in the market that can give all these qualities to children, I am sure none of the parent would miss such a grand opportunity.
However, no such product is available but there is one simple thing that every parent can do to ensure that their child possesses the best coping skills. That simple thing is to put kids to bed early at night. You can gift your children astounding coping skills by just taking them to their bed an hour early than the usual time.
Numerous pediatric researches and studies have proved this point that children who go to bed on time or a little before time exhibit stupendous coping skills, in comparison to the ones who do not take sound sleep. One study was directed towards the finding that the amount of sleep affect the behavior of elementary school kids. As a part of the study, the sample students were asked to sleep for similar hours at night for a week. The teachers at class were told to notice the behavior in terms of their emotional reactions, attentiveness, and irritability in the class.
After a week, the researchers asked the parents of the sample students to put them to bed either earlier or later than the usual time. Consequently, half of the students started sleeping some time more as compared to the others. Again, the teachers in the class were asked to notice the children’s behavior but this time they were ignorant of the fact as to which student has slept more and which has slept for a lesser duration.
When the researchers tallied both the evaluations, it was found that the children who got less sleep were more irritable, less attentive, and highly emotional in class. The sleep-deprived kids had a higher level of frustration and they were the ones who used to cry quite often in classes.
As a contrast to this, the children who got enough sleep were found to be much more under control, happy, emotionally stable, attentive, and intelligent. The study revealed that a small change in the sleeping pattern of a child could do wonders to his overall development.
Parents must do some research on the sleeping patterns and the sleep requirements of their children. Based on the National Sleep Foundation’s guidelines, preschoolers require 11 to 13 hours of sleep per night, 10 to 11 hours of night sleep for school going children (5to10yeras old). Further sleep recommendations for teens are around 8.5 to 9.5 hours per night, and adults should get about 7to9 hours of sound sleep every night.
However, there are hardly any teens and adults who follow these sleep recommendations. Due to work pressure and the late night lifestyle, teens and adults fail to follow their required sleep patterns, and suffer from stress, frustration and even depression.
In the case of small children, parents can take charge and make children sleep at the required timings, so that they fit in well to the sleep pattern that they belong. Parents can switch off the TV, games, and computer and direct children to bed on time. It is also very important for the parents that they too go to bed on time, to serve as a good example for kids.
