Mr. Why You Post So Early?

“Mr. Why You Post So Early?” is a question I am often asked with respect to this blog. I tend to write and submit my posts between 5am and 7am. I know that’s ridiculously early from your perspective, but it works for me.

I’m a morning person, and I alway have been. I’ve had jobs where I had to leave the house at 4am to do my work and that wasn’t a problem for me. I showed up at the Providence Civic Center at 5am two Saturdays in a row when I was a teenager, to buy my sister concert tickets (Got the front row for her {Shaun Cassidy}). Even now, I get up for school days at 4:55am and non-school days & weekends at 5:25am. 

I tend to have the most energy between 5am and 2pm - perfect for a teacher. I start to fade after 3pm and usually take a nap at 4pm. I feel like the nap reboots my brain for the rest of the day/evening/night. I’m good until 10pm or so and am usually asleep by 10:30pm.

This is the natural circadian rhythm of my body and I have learned to work with it instead of fighting it.

This probably sounds appalling to you, that’s because you’re younger and need more sleep. Getting up at 5am would be torture for you. At this point you are just hitting the most important part fo your sleep cycle. 

I know adults sometimes call you lazy for sleeping unit mid/late-morning but you really need that extra sleep. Your brain is working crazy hard all night and needs more time to get its work done. My brain is very different from yours - it’s mature and don’t need to work as hard when I sleep, so I need 7 to 8 hours of sleep per day (For me broken into two separate sleep cycles), the brain of a teenager needs more sleep - something like 8 to 10 hours a day. 

I’ve spoken about this in our class, I am an advocate of starting middle and high school later in the morning. In our school, you need to be in the building at 7:20 to 7:35. You would benefit from the extra sleep you could get each night if we started at 8:20. Your teachers can see that many of you are very quiet and mellow during the first class, your brain is reluctant to fully engage and just craves more sleep. 

Give your brain what it needs - eight to ten hours of really good sleep each day. You will be a healthier, happier and more successful person if you sleep more. 

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Contact information: 

Remind: text @497h7k to 81010

Email: mmckellar@lowell.k12.ma.us