Lesson video

Hello, I'm Mr. Whitehead, and welcome to the RSHE health and prevention, sleep and routine unit.

In this lesson, we're going to be looking at strategies for good quality sleep.

Okay, let's get started with the lesson.

In this lesson you will need the following items, a piece of paper or a note pad, and a pen or a pencil.

There'll be times throughout this lesson where you may want to take some notes down to help you with some of the tasks throughout the lesson.

Okay, let's take a look at the agenda for this lesson.

So first of all, you should have completed the intro quiz and hopefully you got five out of five.

We're then going to take a look at some key words that you won't need throughout this lesson we're then going to look two breathing techniques that can help you get good quality sleep and we're going to practise them together.

We'll then go to look at how we should avoid caffeine before going to sleep.

Then just before the exit quiz, we're going to be looking at bedtime habits that we can instil in our lives forever.

And finally, we're going to be taking the exit quiz where the five questions based on everything that we've learned throughout this lesson.

So let's take a look at the two key words that we'll need throughout this lesson.

So the first one is sleep and sleep is a condition of body and mind that typically occurs for several hours every night in which the central nervous system is relatively inactive.

The eyes are closed postural muscles relax and consciousness is practically suspended.

And secondly caffeine and caffeine is an alkaloid compound which is found especially in tea and coffee plants and is a stimulant of central nervous system.

We will be looking at how this affects our body and sleep later on throughout the lesson.

Okay, so to start us off I want us to have a little quick think about this question.

What is your current bedtime routine? So what do you do in the run-up to you go into bed? Take an opportunity now to pause the video and write down a few things that you do just before going to bed.

Okay pause the video now resume when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

Okay so you've had an opportunity now to look and think about what your current bedtime routine is.

So we're going to go and have a look through some examples of what you may have got down.

They may have put in there that you brush your teeth before going to bed.

You may have a shower, have a bath before bed and you may even put your pyjamas on before bed.

Throughout the lesson, we're going to be looking at how you can improve your bedtime routine to ensure that you get a good quality sleep.

Okay so we're now going to look at some breathing techniques that you can instil to your bedtime routine to improve the quality of your sleep.

And you probably sat there thinking why do I not need to know how to breathe? I breathe every second of every day but these breathing techniques calm the body down by slowing down the functions in the body and they release anxiety and stress which enables us to have a better quality sleep.

So the first one we'll go to look at is the four, seven, eight technique.

And it does exactly as it says.

So each of the numbers corresponds to the number of seconds.

So first of all, you inhale for four seconds.

Once you've inhaled as much oxygen as you can in the four second, you hold your breath for seven seconds before exhaling slowly for eight seconds.

And this can be done before bedtime, just as you get into bed, you can have do it sat in a chair or lay in your bed, wherever you are feel more comfortable.

The second one is box breathing and in box breathing, we breathe slowly through our nose while counting to four and we hold our breath for four seconds and then we exhale for four seconds.

So it is just a box in terms of four, four, four, and then we repeat the steps again and again at least three times to get the maximum effect out of it.

Okay so we're now going to move on and we're going to practise these two techniques together.

Take this opportunity now to find somewhere comfortable to have to sit or lie down before we start the four, seven, eight breathing technique.

Now you may have noticed I've disappeared from your top right corner and that's because I don't want you to concentrate on me I want you to concentrate on your breathing.

Okay, so once you find yourself somewhere comfortable to sit we will start the technique.

Okay, first of all I want you to breathe in for four seconds, now hold your breath for seven now exhale for eight.

Okay, that's one round and we're going to do one more round of the four, seven, eight technique, and then we're going to have a quick go of the box breathing.

Okay, so let's start again.

So four seconds inhaling, getting in as much oxygen as you can.

Now wait start that now breath in as much oxygen as you can in the four seconds and now hold all the oxygen in for seven keep it in for the full seven seconds and now exhale and blow all of that carbon dioxide and that how you've just breathed out for eight.

Okay, well done.

You just managed to complete the four, seven, eight breathing technique.

Now this can be put into your bedtime routine to improve the quality of your sleep.

Okay, before we move on let's have a go at the box breathing.

So this one's fairly straightforward when it's just four seconds, three times on the inhale, holding the breath and then exhale.

Okay, we're going to start in three, two, one inhale for four seconds, now hold your breath for four seconds and exhale for four seconds.

One more time, inhale for four, hold your breath for four, hold all up breath in, now exhale for four.

A fast exhale getting all that air out and relax.

Well done.

You've just now completed two breathing techniques that you can try before bedtime tonight.

Okay, let's move on.

Well now we'll just take a look why it is important to avoid caffeine before going to bed.

Now, what is caffeine and how does it affect us? So caffeine is a stimulant which increases our concentration and alertness.

So every time we take caffeine, our brain is stimulated in a way that keeps us awake and alert which prevents us from getting a good quality sleep.

Examples and drinks that we can find caffeine in are fizzy drinks, coffee, tea, and energy drinks.

Okay, we're now going to look at some habits to avoid excess caffeine.

So the first one is avoid caffeine six hours before you go to bed.

So when we take caffeine it generally lasts around six hours and stimulates the brain and keeps us awake.

And that is why a lot of people drink coffee in the morning to try and wake them up after their sleep without feeling a little bit sluggish.

There are some decaf options for some of the drinks that we've spoken about which you can also use.

You can also water down fizzy drinks and energy drinks just to dilute and reduce the amount of caffeine you have in taken in one drink.

And the last one is herbal teas and herbal teas are really useful just before bed because they can relax us, reduce any stress and improve the quality of sleep.

So I would try some of these habits that you can include into your bedtime routine to try and improve that quality of sleep.

Okay, let's move on.

So based on the information that we've just gone through you going to answer the following question.

Caffeine boosts the quality of our sleep.

Is that true or is that false? Leave you a few seconds to think of the answer for this question.

Okay, let's take a look at what the answer is.

And the answer is of course false.

Avoid drinking caffeine six hours before going to sleep, caffeine can also reduce the amount of deep sleep that we can enjoy.

And the more deep sleep we have the better sleep we're going to have, the more rest and the better we're going to feel when we wake up.

So avoid caffeine as much as possible and if you can try some herbal teas to help us get to sleep.

Okay, let's move on to the next part of the lesson.

We're now going to look at some bedtime habits that we can instil into our routines for life.

So the first one is setting an alarm to signal sleep time.

It's really important to have a set routine and a set time that we go to sleep and the time that we wake up.

'Cause it programmes our body when to wake up in terms of our body functioning and when to wind down at night time.

And it may all be also be useful to set your alarm to signal when you should start your routine for bedtime and your bedtime routine should take anywhere between 30 minutes and two hours depending on how much you fit into your routine.

The second one is eat light and healthy before bed.

The last thing we want is to eat a heavy meal just before going to bed.

This can cause an active stomach and cause acid reflux in our stomach and waking up throughout the night can be common issue back and forth to the toilet.

But also on the flip side if we don't eat anything before bedtime we can get an uncomfortable stomach through stomach pains throughout the hunger that we've got in our stomach and so it's really important that we eat a light but healthy meal just before bedtime.

And the third one, which is one of my favourites personally is having a shower or bath before bedtime and especially a warm shower.

And this can wash away any stresses and it happens just you and your own, bit of hygiene, cleanse yourself just before you can get ready for bed, but definitely warm shower or bath is higher up on my list of habits for life.

No devices one hour prior to sleep.

Now, there is a lesson in the shoot it when we go through device use and how it affects the brain and how it makes us more alert and awake through the use of our devices.

So it's really important that we try not to use our devices an hour before we go to sleep.

Lower the lights if you've got dimmers in your rooms dim the lights before going to bed, it just gets our eyes and our brain ready to wind down for sleep time.

Drinking a warm drink as we mentioned before herbal drinks avoid caffeine and before bedtime, but now warm drinks might just be warm milk, warm water or even a herbal tea.

Reduce your anxiety about creating a to-do list.

So people can often go to bed and really worry about what's going to happen the next day and that can cause many anxieties and many issues with getting to sleep.

So writing a to do list for your next day can ease your brain and your anxiety to make sure you do get a better quality sleep.

And relax muscles and mind with yoga.

So this is something I've instilled into my routine over the last six months and it's really helped me wind down and stretch the muscles and ultimately relax mind as well so definitely recommend you try it.

There is plenty of videos on YouTube that you can do for yoga.

And there are a couple of apps you can download on your smartphones.

Read and now read is not for everyone I understand that, but I would highly recommend whether it's a news article or a book, reading does reduce stress and helps us wind down just before bedtime.

And the last one is avoid napping during the day.

Now I used to be guilty of this when I was younger I used to come in from school go straight to sleep for an hour and then I'd struggled to get to sleep when I went to bed.

So avoid having a nap.

If you are tired, try and hold onto bed time 'cause you will sleep a lot better and get the most out of your sleep.

Yeah, so these are bedtime habits for life that I would recommend and been recommended by many of organisations including the NHS and the Sleep Foundation.

So try some of these at bedtime tonight, try to instil as many as you can over the next forthcoming months.

So my bedtime routine, so I start about 8:00 PM.

It takes me about an hour.

I generally get into bed about nine o'clock and usually asleep by about 20 past half past nine.

So I start off eight o'clock with a bit of yoga in the dark with a candle.

This just helps me lower the mood and wind down before bedtime, I'll then take a warm shower to release some stresses and moisturise.

One of the big things that helps me moisturise on my face and body just helps me wind down at night time.

I will then read for a short period of time, maybe only 10, 15 minutes.

I'll then turn my lights out, I've got a dimmer in my bedroom, so I'll turn it down to dim before I do my to-do list what I've been on my mind just before I'm going to bed, I'll do my to do list and then I will completely turn my lights out and I go to sleep.

So this is my bedtime routine.

I'd love if you could try and instil some of these routines or some of the routines and habits that we mentioned on the previous slide, I promise you if you instil at least one of them you will feel some kind of difference to your sleep or how you may feel over the period of say a week if you do this routine and habits continuously.

Okay, let's move on now.

We're now going to take a look at how Chelsea sleep is becoming an issue in her life.

So Chelsea has her GCSE exams approaching and is getting very stressed at nighttime about the following day.

She gets home from school, naps until 5:00 PM then studies in her room until she goes to sleep.

Usually she will not eat her evening meal until approximately 8:00 PM.

When she has coursework deadlines approaching, she will stay up late drinking coffee to help her concentrate.

Chelsea has spoken to her parent about having trouble sleeping.

So based on the scenario about Chelsea here are your following questions.

What factors are causing Chelsea sleep troubles and what bedtime habits could Chelsea adopt to improve her sleep? Okay, take this opportunity now to pause the video use your pen and paper to come up with as many ideas using Chelsea scenario.

Okay, pause the video now when you're ready to resume hit the play button.

Welcome back.

Okay, we going to take a look at Chelsea's scenario now and break it down into what factors could be causing Chelsea's sleep troubles and then what bedtime habits could she adopt? So here was some things that I came up with based on Chelsea's scenario.

So first of all, Chelsea is very stressed at nighttime about the following day and that's becoming an issue when she's going to sleep because she's struggling to sleep because she's thinking about the following day.

So one habit that she could implement based on this trouble is to write a to do list.

This will help release anxiety if she's got it all down on paper of what she's going to do in the next day.

The next one I spotted was that Chelsea has naps when she gets in from school and that's not good and what she should do is if she is feeling sleepy and a bit tired is struggle through all the way till bedtime and over time her routine of her going to bed and waking up at a certain time will improve the quality of her sleep.

The third thing I picked up on with Chelsea was having her evening meal at 8:00 PM.

That's very late and that's going to cause issues in her stomach and probably caused her to be waking up in the middle of the night.

So what she should do is eat a light snack or a light meal at a normal time.

So around about six, seven o'clock reasonable time but make sure it's a healthy meal so it doesn't cause any stomach issues during the night.

Now the last one I picked up on is when Chelsea is doing her coursework she's drinking a lot of coffee late at night and this is going to stimulate the brain and keep her awake for longer.

So what she should do is avoid drinking coffee or any drinks that contain caffeine and look at herbal teas or warm drinks to bring her down and wind her down before bedtime.

Well done if you picked up on some of those issues and the solutions and the habits that can be implemented to improve the quality of sleep for Chelsea,.

Okay let's move on to the final task.

So just before you do the exit quiz, you have one last task and you have been asked to create a bedtime routine for year of 11s who are struggling with sleep while studying for their GCCEs.

So things you need to include.

Have a four step routine that year of 11s could use during their exam season.

And you need to include what they should or do or avoid to improve their quality of sleep and why.

So what impact will each of your steps have on this year 11s students sleep? This is an example that I came with earlier.

So my first step is to avoid large meals just before going to sleep as this may cause discomfort as our body attempts to digest food.

Okay, take the opportunity now to complete the task and resume the video when you're ready to finish off the lesson.

Thank you so much for your efforts during this lesson today.

I hope you've learned a lot and enjoyed all the tasks we're going to.

If you would like to please ask your parent or caregiver to share your work on Twitter tagging @OakNational and #learnwithOak.

It's been an absolute pleasure to teach you today and I hope to see you all again soon.

Take care.