Last week Miss Wynne and I facilitated a sleep workshop with Year 9 students. The students completed a self- assessment of their sleep routine habits and then set some goals to improve their score. We also taught the students about using a body scan mindfulness activity to help with relaxation at night in bed. Below is a list of the habits we discussed. We encourage you to take some time to think about the sleep habits of your family and set some goals on how you could work on improving sleep routines.

Two reflections we noticed from the workshop is that there are a number of our students who have challenges with sleep routines, so this session was needed by many. We will continue to encourage positive sleep behaviours and habits next year. The second reflection is how common sleepovers with friends have become, with some students reporting even having these during the school week. We would like you to consider saving the treat/ reward of a sleepover with peers for the school holidays, so that the “lack of sleep” does not impact on the students during their school week. Even sleepovers on the weekend of a school term have a negative impact on how motivated and refreshed students are on a Monday after the weekend.

Tips for sleep:

1. Have a regular, relaxing routine just before bedtime. You may have busy, hectic schedules during the day with activities and need a chance to unwind at night.

2. To help you relax, avoid activities that will excite your senses late in the evening. You need to find another time for computer games, action/horror movies, intense reading or heavy studying.

3. Do not have anything with caffeine (including fizzy drinks and chocolate) after 4pm.

4. Also avoid smoking and drinking, which we hope teenagers will do anyway! Along with hurting your health, nicotine and alcohol will disturb your sleep.

5. A regular exercise routine and a healthy diet will help you sleep better at night.

6. Keep the lights dim in the evening. Open the curtains or blinds to let in bright light in the morning. This helps keep your body clocks set at the right time.

7. If you must take a nap, you should keep it to under an hour.

8. You may want to wake up later on weekends. But you should not wake up more than two hours later than the time you normally rise on a weekday. Sleeping in longer than that will severely disrupt your body clock. This will make it even harder to wake up on time when Monday morning arrives.