Reading Comprehension - Sleep Cycle

Read the passage on the importance of sleep and the sentences that follow it.
Your task is to choose

the option that is nearest in the meaning to what the article says. Write the letters in the boxes next to
the number. An example has been given to you.
The importance of sleep

Research has found that lack of sleep affects teens’ ability to function at school. A recent study showed that
sleep deprivation can affect mood, performance, attention, learning, behaviour and biological functions.
This means that daytime sleepiness makes it difficult to concentrate and learn, or even stay awake in class.
Too little sleep may also shape intelligence, and contribute to the increasing obesity levels among
schoolchildren.
It has been established that children get an hour less sleep every night than they did 30 years ago. This
tendency starts as early as preschool where the difference is half an hour and amounts to half of adolescents
sleeping less than seven hours a night. The reason for childhood and teenage sleep deprivation are various,
ranging from overscheduling of activities and too much homework to television sets, computers and mobile
phones in the bedroom. Permissiveness about bedtimes, which is often driven by guilt of not having enough
time to spend with the children, is another contributing factor. Even schools can be blamed since many
start as early as seven in the morning.
Sleep deprivation is a serious problem, and now that the consequences are being isolated and measured by
scientists, we cannot ignore it any longer. Since the brain is not fully developed until the age of 21, it is
essential for people younger than that to get enough sleep to allow time for the maturing process. Lack of
sleep does not only impair academic performance and emotional stability, but also contributes to
problems like obesity and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Modern technology has made it possible to understand just how sleep deprivation harms children’s brains.
The use of magnetic resonance-imaging scans, for example, has revealed that children can’t remember what
they have just learned because neurons lose their plasticity and become unable to form synaptic connections
necessary to encode a memory. It has also been established that sleep loss debilitates the body’s ability
to extract glucose from the bloodstream. The lack of glucose impairs prefrontal cortex, which is
responsible for executive functions like planning how to meet goals, prediction of outcomes and perceiving
consequences. As a result, children cannot concentrate and become inattentive in class.
What happens to the child’s brain at night is even more important. Each stage of sleep plays its own unique
role in capturing memories and sleep is part of the process of consolidation of these memories. Even adults
form and store huge numbers of experiences in the head every day, and sleep is needed for the brain to cope
with it all. And children, who spend most of their time learning and meeting new experiences, have an
increased need for sleep. Although the brain synthesises some memories during the day, they are enhanced
and concretised during the night. What is more, new inferences and associations are also drawn when
sleeping, and these lead to insights the next day.
All the above explains why a good night’s sleep is not only important for long-term learning of vocabulary,
timetables, historical dates and all other factual minutiae, be also for the healthy development of the brain
and the physiological and psychological well-being of children.
0. According to studies, not getting enough sleep

a) makes it more difficult to study.
b) has a significant influence on behaviour.
c) results in falling asleep in class.
d) has no influence on physical appearance.
1. 30 years ago, teenagers slept
a) much longer than nowadays.
b) half an hour more than today.
c) about eight hours a night.
d) roughly half an hour more than preschoolers.
2. Schoolchildren do not get enough sleep because

a) their schedule is too full of homework.
b) their parents can only spend time with them in the evening.
c) various factors disturb their sleep.
d) school and free time activities are put first.
3. The consequences of sleep deprivation were

a) completely unknown until recently.
b) not discussed in the 20th century.
c) not thought to be as diverse as now.
d) not thought to be measurable.
4. Sleeping enough
a) guarantees stable emotional development for children.
b) helps children to get better results at school.
c) makes children thinner.
d) stops children from being hyperactive.
5. Magnetic resonance scanners have shown that

a) children easily forget what they learned the previous day.
b) neurons tend to lose their plasticity even at a very early age.
c) not getting enough sleep makes it harder to remember things.
d) synaptic connections are needed to encode memories.
6. Glucose
a) comes to the brain from the bloodstream.
b) is not produced when we are awake.
c) is responsible for planning and prediction.
d) causes inattentiveness in class.
7. Children need more sleep than adults since

a) their brains grow at a greater speed than those of most adults.
b) many new things they encounter are experienced by them.
c) they gain new knowledge to a greater extent than most adults.
d) they store a huge number of experiences in their heads every day.
8. Associations and inferences are

a) never drawn at daytime.
b) the way to new understanding.
c) enhanced during the night.
d) concretised by the brain.
0. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.
a

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Read the passage on the importance of sleep and the sentences that follow it.

Your task is to choose

The importance of sleep

0. According to studies, not getting enough sleep

2. Schoolchildren do not get enough sleep because

3. The consequences of sleep deprivation were

5. Magnetic resonance scanners have shown that

7. Children need more sleep than adults since

8. Associations and inferences are

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