Biological - NIH Office of Science Education - National Institutes of ...

Alertness first increases (sleepiness decreases) in midmorning, then
alertness decreases during the afternoon. Alertness then increases
again in the early evening before sleepiness takes over at bedtime.
and
3. For those classrooms with access to the Internet, you may access
your class data at http://science.education.nih.gov/supplements/sleep
/student. Click on “Lesson 1—What Is Sleep?” and then enter your
class code. Click on “Generate Report” and select one of the sleepiness
scale options.
For classrooms without access to the Internet, collect students’
sleepiness scale data on the board and calculate class averages for
each time point.
4. Instruct students to work individually or in small teams. They
should develop a hypothesis, test it by using the data in the sleep
database, and provide a short written summary of their findings.
As in Lesson 1, students can formulate hypotheses, build a custom
report, and evaluate the data presented in the report. Classes without
Internet access can test their hypotheses using the class data set.
Classes not using the sleep database have less data available for their
use. Therefore, it is important that you also provide them with the
sleep diary data used in Lesson 1. Students can then test hypotheses
that relate data from the sleep diary to those from the sleepiness
scale.
Make sure that students are testing answerable questions using information
in the database. Some appropriate hypotheses include
a. there are male/female differences in the cycling of alertness
during the day;
b. school start time has an effect on the timing of the dips in
alertness and peaks of sleepiness during the day;
c. latitude affects the timing of the dips in alertness and peaks of
sleepiness during the day; and
d. total sleep time affects the timing of the dips in alertness and
peaks of sleepiness during the day.
5. After the class has had the opportunity to test their questions, ask
for volunteers to share their hypothesis and findings. Ask students
why they asked the questions they did.
6. If students can’t determine whether the data support their hypothe-
Content Standard A:
Identify questions and
concepts that guide
scientific investigations.
Content Standard A:
Communicate and
defend a scientific
argument.
Assessment: Instruct
students to write a brief
report that states their
hypothesis, the type of
data from sleep diaries
used to test the
hypothesis, and their
conclusions. If a firm
conclusion is not supported
by the data,
instruct students to
explain what additional
information would be
needed to reach a
conclusion.
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Student Lesson 3