Article #2 – Draft
Is sleep your top priority? Everyone lives a life that is different as they are unique. Being so different, there is no way we are in the same room as the other person. It’s a mind thing, you may be in the same room as them, but your minds are in different places. With the different way our minds work, it’s the same when it comes to sleep. The average time your body needs to sleep is eight hours. Not saying you need eight hours, it’s just average. Carol Garvey, Morningside’s Nurse, says, “Seven to nine is rejuvenating.”
Sleep is important. When I asked her if college students need a lot of sleep or no…she replied: “Everybody needs sl-,” she laughs, “The right amount of sleep. But, um…College students, we know, proven that they don’t get- They are way behind on sleep and it’s a cumulative year after year, you can never make up lost sleep.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
“Really?”
“You can never make up lost sleep.”
An interesting argument made by the nurse. Of course, not everyone has to believe it, but it does make a lot of sense. It all has to do with the REM cycle. The REM Cycle is considered a full cycle of sleep. Your body needs to get every night. Everyone gets to the REM Cycle at different points of sleep. Some may get a full night’s sleep at six hours, others at eight, maybe even some at five. Paige McKern a student, for instance, says she can function at six hours of sleep, but her best abilities are at eight hours of sleep.
Paige McKern, a junior at Morningside College, is involved in a lot of things such as: holding the Secretary position on Morningside’s Student Government, Entrepreneurship, a residence assistant in the Plex, manager at the Morningside Post Office, an associate at American Eagle, full-time student, involved in Morningside Activities Council, homecoming committee, and that’s just a few of them. With her busy life she has a planner and without it she would be lost. Between all of these things, she tries to get eight hours of sleep, but some days she just gets six.
“Is too much sleep a bad thing?”
“I guess it depends on the person. Because some people like have a hard time getting to sleep. So it could be varied on that, I know I fall asleep within five minutes because I am never completely fully really caught up on sleep.”
A tip Carol would like to share is: “If people had that hour in the day time where they didn’t nap instead did their screen work, their homework, use your 8-5 time do that hour, wouldn’t that buy you an hour in the evening to not do homework and then you would sleep better because you didn’t nap.”
Practice good sleep hygiene and wake up at the same time every day. On the weekends, wake up within the hour. Find a routine and stick to it. It’ll help your body prepare itself for a good night’s sleep. Take less naps during the day and instead if napping, do your homework. Right before bed, limit your screen time and instead of staring at a screen switch it out with a book. Don’t drink much or any caffeine, because that may then throw off your sleep cycle and same goes for alcohol. Everything affects people differently, but these are just some tips to help get a good night’s sleep. Last, I would like to leave you with this Paige McKern said, “Sleep is wonderful.” And I think we can all relate to that.
• You would be fine cleaning up Carol’s first quote. Just as long as you don’t
change the meaning.
• Work on the lead. Now that you’ve written a draft you should have a good
idea of what you’re trying to say. Make that the focus of the lead: Sleep is
important. So is getting the right amount of sleep. Go from there.
• Remove yourself. You don’t need to be in here.
• One idea to a paragraph. One source to a paragraph.
Great job! I really enjoyed the information you included and the fact that it wasn’t boring by any means! I liked that you used a conversation format for some quotes. At first I didn’t think it was appropriate, but after reading through, I realized the life that it added to the article! Good job!
With that said, the lead is a touch long. Maybe if you made a short intro and then went in to that paragraph. It was a touch confusing, but if you just focused it more, I think it would be great!
In the second paragraph, I would suggest watching word choice (use not instead of no and Garvey instead of her). Also try to polish up Carol Garvey’s quote a bit. The “um” and many pause breaks distract from the overall flow.
Lastly, paragraphs are a little long. The information is great, so maybe just split some of them in half and make the ideas individual!
You are very talented! If your article was in a magazine or newspaper, I would be drawn to it, because it isn’t typical. It’s interesting and holds a distinct voice! Keep it up!
I really enjoyed this article. I found some of things interesting but there is a couple of things i would suggest. The first is that the first paragraph was a little wordy and was kinda hard to follow. The last thing is when you switch to is to much sleep a bad thing I was not sure if that was Carol or Paige saying the quote so clarify that. Otherwise, this is a real good article ….maybe a little short.