Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Muma Khan
Independent Research G/T
2105-2016
Title: Can Sleepyheads Be Brainiacs?
Introduction and Overview of Research:
The general area of investigation in the project is to determine if sleep deprivation in high school
students is declining their grades. If it is, finding the solution is definitely important. There are
many suggested solutions, but the focus of this project is to see how homework factors into how
much sleep students are getting and whether homework levels should be reduced in order to help
students get the sleep that they need. This project revolves around what the students takes are on
the issue of homework and whether or not they believe reducing homework is the best solution to
increasing the amount of sleep they get compared to the other suggested solutions.
Background and Rationale
Many high school students are sleep deprived. Research shows the causes for this are
many, including staying up late doing homework, playing video games, etc. For whatever reason
it is that they are staying awake, they lose the sleep that they need. Pediatricians recommend that
adolescents get at least 8-9 hours of sleep, but only 15 percent of high school students are only
getting 8.5 hours of sleep or more (Carpenter 42). Many studies show that not getting enough
sleep may be hurting the overall grades of students. One study shows PET scans of one brain
after total sleep deprivation, and another brain after a night of normal sleep, and compares them
(Walker, M.P., R. Stickgold, D. Alsop, N. Gaab, and G. Schlaug 911-917). It is shown that the
brains cognitive area is a lot less alert after total sleep deprivation. This shows that its hard for
students to focus when they dont get enough sleep, and so their skills to absorb and take in new
information during classes will be limited, eventually causing their overall grade to be lower.
There are many different suggestions to solve this problem. They include limiting
technology, reducing excessive homework amounts, and even shifting school start times an hour
to a half an hour later. The most argued issue today is that pediatricians are recommending to
shift school start times to no earlier than 8 30 a.m. However, many schools still havent done this
yet because they feel it's impractical because of obstacles like bus schedules and the high
expenses associated with doing so (Richter "Among Teens, Sleep Deprivation an Epidemic").
Also, it would interfere with students schedules and extracurricular activities for which they
have set schedules they already are used to.
This study of whether sleep affects a high school students cognitive ability is significant
because it relates to a huge population of high school students. Many high school students are
sleep deprived today, and finding a solution to this problem is highly necessary, especially if it is
hurting their grades. Finding a solution to this problem that would be convenient for high school
students across the country will not only help students get more sleep, but it will also help them
prevent their grades from declining. Also, if homework does happen to factor into why students
arent receiving the amount of sleep they need to achieve good grades in school, then methods to
to reduce excess homework can be found to help students grades as well.
Research Methodology:
Research Question: Does the amount of sleep a student gets affect their cognitive performance?
If so, how does homework levels factor into fixing this problem of sleep deprivation in high
school students?
Research Hypothesis: The less sleep a student gets, the harder it will be for them to focus during
school, causing their overall academic performance to decline. The extended hypothesis is that
excessive homework is one of the main problems students are facing that is causing them to be
sleep deprived. Many students are sleep deprived due to excessive amounts of homework, and
reducing it to 10 minutes of homework multiplied by the number of the grade the student is in,
for example 10 minutes of homework for a 1st grader, 20 for a second grader, and so on (Kalish
"Parents Should Take Action Against Excessive Homework"). This is recommended because too
much homework causes students to sleep later. It also causes extra stress and anxiety in students,
hurting their emotional stability to focus in school (Hancock"Do Kids Have Too Much
Homework?").
Research Design Model: The research design is descriptive research that includes mostly
qualitative research, however it does include some quantitative as well. After doing research and
finding that many studies have shown and proven that less sleep negatively affects a students
overall academic performance, finding out which method to fixing sleep deprivation in students
is important. The variables in this project include amount of sleep a student gets, their grades,
and the amount of homework they receive each night for school.
Data Collection: Surveys/Questionnaires would be the best source of data collection for this
project. We could use surveys to get the opinions of students on whether or not they believe that
homework should be reduced, and that it is one of the many reasons they are losing sleep. They
also could answer questions related to how much sleep they usually get and what their overall
grades are. Data will be collected from high school students at Mt. Hebron High School. The
originality of this particular project lies in it going the further step to discover what the students
prefer regarding how to fix sleep deprivation, and what they think needs to be done in order to
fix this issue.
Product Objectives:
The primary research can be displayed in a journal article discussing the results of the survey,
and what the students themselves believe should happen in order to fix the problem of sleep
deprivation in high school students. It can even be taken a step further if majority of the results
point towards students promoting less homework, where a petition can be made and taken to
authorities in the building to ask their permission for reducing excessive homework. The product
will inform the general audience of people who have been heatedly debating over how to solve
this problem of sleep deprivation in teens. It will be put up on a blog or website to inform those
people on this issue. It can also be beneficial to those schools that find it too difficult to shift
school start times, as they can use reducing homework amounts as an alternative to that solution.
The target audience to whom the oral presentation will be given to teachers of Mount Hebron
High School to ask them to consider reducing excess amounts of homework.
Logistic Considerations:
The project would need both humans and a computer in order to type up the journal article and in
order to understand what the students believe is the best solution tothe problem. Also, for the
petition, human signatures are needed by the students and human consent is needed by
authorities to determine whether or not they would like to put the plan in action. Permission is
also needed to create the petition in the first place.
Timeline- In third quarter, a timeline will be added that outlines the data collection, product
development, and audience distribution.
Timeline:
For my project, I am proposing that the best alternative solution to shifting to later school
start times to achieve less sleep deprivation in high school students is reducing excess
homework. The form of data collection I chose was both meta- analysis of previous studies and
Im also conducting my own surveys asking students questions about what they believe/ prefer
would be the best solution to their sleep deprivation. I hope to give an oral presentation that
includes my final product which will be a petition I create that calls for reduction of excess
homework. It will also includes a display of both my research and my results to the surveys on
my display board and will basically ask teachers to consider reducing excess homework and will
define excess homework.
Date
Item to be
Completed
Further Elaboration
3/10/16
Have Brainstormed
Survey Questions
ready
3/10/16
3/10/16
Conference with
Dr.Kiehl
3/12/16
Display Board
Sketch
3/12/16
Finalize my Survey
Questions
Completed?
Finalize Survey
Questions with the
School
3/13/16
3/14/16
Distribute Surveys
3/24/16
Receive Surveys
Spring Break
Meta- Analysis
Spring Break
Spring Break
Spring Break
Start working on
board
presentable
4/4/16
Putting together
petition
4/8/16
Finish making
Petition
4/12/16
4/16/16
Begin putting
together work for
Display Board
4/24/16
4/18/16
4/24/16
4/27/16
5/26/16
Present Final
Presentation
References:
Carpenter, Siri. "Sleep Deprivation May Be Undermining Teen Health." 32.9. (2010):42. Print.
Hancock, LynNell. "Do Kids Have Too Much Homework?" Smithsonian.com. Smithsonian.com,
21 August 2011. Web. 1 Dec. 2015.
Kalish, Nancy. "Parents Should Take Action Against Excessive Homework." Do Students Have
Too Much Homework? Ed. Judeen Bartos. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2012. At Issue.
Rpt. from "The Less-Homework Revolution." Parenting (1 July 2008). Opposing
Viewpoints in Context. Web. 5 Nov. 2015.
Richter, Ruthann. "Among Teens, Sleep Deprivation an Epidemic." News Center. Stanford
Medicine, 8 Oct. 2015. Web. 8 Dec. 2015.
Walker, M.P., R. Stickgold, D. Alsop, N. Gaab, and G. Schlaug. "Sleep-Dependent Motor
Memory Plasticity in the Human Brain." Neuroscience 133 (911-917). M.P. Walker Et
Al., 1 Apr. 2005. Web. 12 Nov. 2015.