MARCO POLO Blogging #1: Does School/Work Start Too Early?
Marco Polo week:
This just cracks me up.
I’ve really slacked off on blogging lately, mainly because I’ve been writing and letting my busy life take precedence. Crazy, right?
So, I think I’ll take up Marco-Polo Blogging this week. (No, that’s not a real thing; I just invented it. I’m cool like that.) My plan is to post an interesting, controversial, humorous, or otherwise entertaining conversation topic and photo up here, and then see what kind of comments on it show up in my feed. The comments are my favorite part of blogging anyway. I really enjoy reading what you guys have to say. I’ll say “Marco;” you say “Polo.”
Here’s my MARCO for today:
What do you guys think about the typical 8:00 a.m. start time for school and work? What do you really think? I mean, it was based on our agricultural and later industrial roots, (both of which are antiquated now in the 21st C) when it was vital to get up and at ‘em early in the day – to milk the cows, plow the fields, get on the assembly line etc., and get it all done by sun-down. Why do we keep to this agricultural-, and factory-model of work and education times, when so many studies have shown that starting just a little later on in the morning (therefore going a bit later in the afternoon) is actually much better suited to our own innate clocks? Here’s a brief commentary on it: The Health Benefits of Later School Hours.
Yes, I’m inspired by my own sleepiness this Monday morning, as well as the overall sleepiness and frustration of my school-aged daughters. (And yes, I get them to bed at a decent hour.) I just know that on those days in the winter time when school is delayed an hour or two, the girls are wide awake, refreshed and ready to learn.
Please enter your “POLO” in the comment area.
~Thanks!
Posted on September 17, 2012, in My Life, Family & Friends, Writing and tagged agriculture, assembly lines, circadian clocks, education reform, factories, health, industry, instruction, internal clocks, school, school hours, sleepiness, work, work hours. Bookmark the permalink. 6 Comments.
10AM start!! Or 9:30. I know I learn more that way because I was actually, you know, awake during university as opposed to high school. I remember being in class in high school and only keeping my eyes open through sheer force of will.
This was my husband all the way through med school….His classmates said he was the only guy they knew who could fall asleep drinking a can of Coke – while holding the can….standing up in the hallway during rounds…..
8:00 a.m. you say? Makes me want to cry when I picture the wee ones being wanked out of bed so early. It’s too early to make life so hard; plenty of time for that much later.
Older grades, post secondary: I’m not so soft but still wonder what the heck is wrong with 9:00 a.m. Why can’t we allow our kids be kids while they can be?
Some say it’s even more important for adolescents than the wee ones…
I hate to think of the young ones having to get up so early, too, especially when they have to be up extra early to ride a school bus. But there are so many working parents who have to be at their places of employment early. Just wonder how that would affect getting kids to school if it opened later.
I suppose it depends on the job, of course, but the 8:00 start time for work is ludicrous and antiquated too, don’t you think?