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A recent National Sleep Foundation poll on youngsters' sleep habits unmasked what many sleep experts have assumed for years: Children aren't getting enough sleep.

For instance, children under 10 don't have the minimum amount of rest suggested for them. The study also showed that many parents aren't conscious of how much rest is enough for his or her children.

"It is obvious from the study results that we have to focus as much on the sleeping half children's lives as we do on the waking half," said Jodi A. Mindell, seat of the poll's task force. "Children are plainly perhaps not getting enough sleep."

In accordance with Arthur Grehan, executive director of American Innerspring Manufacturers, a nonprofit trade party, it is a long-standing issue that's finally coming into the spotlight.

"For years, we have focused many of our industry's academic resources on home and class room resources directed at teaching families about the significance of sleep for their children," Grehan said.

So what can parents do? Step one would be to discover how much sleep their children should get. According to the National Sleep Foundation, pre-schoolers should average 11 to 13 hours of sleep each day, and school-age kids (first- through fifth-graders) should be getting 10 to 11 hours.

In accordance with Grehan, the bed itself sometimes contributes to a child's lack of sleep. Intention proposes that children sleep on typical innerspring mattresses that are no more than nine years old.

Pre-schoolers graduate and "many toddlers from the crib to the thin foam mattresses that included an item of youth furniture, and a number of the youth who are on full-size beds are sleeping on hand-me-down mattresses that are over 10 years old," he said. "In the conclusion, an excellent night's sleep for a young child implies that the parents may rest easy, too." partner sites