We have to set the record straight – it’s now or never – so that the back-to-school period can be lived as calmly as possible…
Old and young go back to school. So, any good self-respecting parent thinks that we have to get our lives back in order.
Screens and sleep
And first of all, it is important that children and teenagers get off their favorite screens before going to bed. TV, computer, or any screen before going to bed are bad for sleep. Between a last episode of cartoon and acrobatics on the sofa, better the 2nd solution. This has been demonstrated on several occasions: children who spend the most time in front of screens also take longer than others to fall asleep.
Teenagers tend to go to bed later anyway. We have to fight against that. Young people already have a biological propensity to delay their pace. But, according to sleep specialists, screen activity may increase the phase shift even more. Turning off the lights at 10 p.m. is undoubtedly exaggerated, but on the other hand, fighting for the screens to be turned off at least half an hour before sleeping is essential for having a good quality of sleep.
Breakfast
In the morning, you have to fight so that your children do not leave hungry.
Breakfast is no longer popular. In 2003, 80% of teenagers took a real one. Today, one out of two. This is not necessarily a health disaster, but in 2003 school snacks were abolished – to fight against overweight and obesity – and this meant that some children had nothing to eat between lunch day before and lunch the next day. And teachers often notice a drop in attention in the late morning.
What to do ? Already, we do not force someone to eat if he is not hungry. We can encourage him by offering him a variety of foods, by having breakfast with him to make it a pleasant moment. And you can even, for teenagers, slip him a cereal bar in his bag.
For a young person who is already overweight, it is true that breakfast is more important, because otherwise the young person arrives hungry for snacks and rushes on fatty and sugary foods. That said, you should know that we have only had breakfast since the 18th century, and that cereals, invented by the good Dr Kellogg, only arrived at the end of the 19th century.
So, first, we listen to our hunger and there is no ideal menu… In short, parents, don’t be too prescriptive…
“Clean up your room”
The other big refrain from parents in this new school year is “tidy up your room”.
In fact, the American Association of Psychological Sciences recently conducted studies on the subject. And the results will reassure the most messy among us. Certainly, people who work on a tidy desk tend to eat healthier, to be more generous, etc. But, those who cultivate disorder are on the other hand more creative, less conventional.
However, not sure that creativity is the first quality required to be first in class. But to reassure parents who have a fairly messy teenager, let’s recall the words of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. He would have said: “A tidy desk is the sign of a disturbed mind”!
For these children who are going to inaugurate the new school rhythms, chronobiologists agree on one point: the 2-day weekend break totally desynchronizes the biological clock of children. As a result, on Monday, they are in the same state as an adult returning from a trip, in full jet lag! For the Academy of Medicine: “The 4-day week is a total biological nonsense”. The fact of shortening the days of class is a consensus, because the academicians estimate that 5 hours of learning per day for schoolchildren, 6 in college and 7 in high school, is the maximum. Homework included! In short, the reform is going in the right direction, even if specialists believe that it does not go far enough.
