Leasa Van Wyk, age 8, of New Sharon, Iowa, for her question:
HOW DO WE GO TO SLEEP?
Some evenings when you're having so much fun and you're busy with lots of interesting activities, you hate to have bedtime come around. You wish you could stay up all night and not have to take time for sleep. But then you realize how important sleep really is, and how refreshed you feel after a good night's slumber. So you hop into bed, and in less than a dozen seconds you're fast asleep.
What happens when you slip between the sheets, close your eyes and relax? When all activity stops, your muscles let go. As you slip into sleep, your heartbeat and breathing rate slow down. You lose all awareness of your surroundings.
All human beings and many kinds of animals must have a certain amount of daily sleep at regular intervals. The procegs is an involuntary one. At a certain time of the day, after you've worked and played hard for many hours, sleepiness seems to take over. It is possible to delay sleep for a while, but before too long you have to give into the compelling feeling and head for bed.
While some adults can get by with only six hours of sleep a night, most feel best when they sleep between seven and eight hours. By the time a baby is about three months old, he is able to sleep the entire night through and then spends most of his day napping. As a child grows, he gives up daytime napping. A four year old usually averages between 10 and 14 hours sleep a night, while the time shrinks to between nine and 12 hours by the time a child is 10.
Sleep is like a tonic. It actually restores energy to your body. The brain and the nervous system, especially, are benefited by sleep.
Dreaming is an important part of sleep, too. Dreams, the scientists tell us, are important for maintaining some mental activities as learning, reasoning and emotional adjustment.
Not all of the answers regarding sleep can be answered by the scientists. They aren't sure why man can't simply rest, as insects do, and give up sleep. They know that the need for sleep must be filled. And they don't know, exactly, how sleep restores vigor to the body.
A person can force himself to stay awake for a limited number of days. After about two days, however, he will find that lengthy concentration becomes difficult. He will also have to force himself to do tasks well that he could do almost automatically when he was rested and alert. After three days without sleep it is difficult to think, see and hear clearly. A person in this condition will also lose track of his thoughts in the middle of speaking a sentence.
No, there's no way to get along without sleep.