No doubt about it: sleep does a growing body good.

Teachers have long noted that well-rested children seem more energetic and are better able to pay attention. And any mom or dad knows that skipping just one nap can throw a kid off-kilter for days.

But a cheery, pliable disposition is just the beginning of the sleep story. Each time your child drifts off, a complex chain of processes cues up in the brain and body that work to nurture your child's problem-solving skills, creativity and even emotional intelligence.

For starters, a good night's sleep enhances memory by making it easier for your child to interface with new information. According to research from the Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School, sleep not only better prepares humans to form new memories, but it also helps them to integrate those new memories into the brain's existing framework. Think of your child's dreaming time as a dress rehearsal for waking life: the brain is busy strengthening connections and shuffling memories around so they'll be easily accessible later on.

A study published in the "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences" in 2009 uncovered a possible link between Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep and the forging of new connections in the brain between previously unrelated ideas.

These kinds of connections may be essential to creative development. When kids sleep deeply, the study suggests, their brains use the downtime to stitch together concepts they've been exposed to during waking life and to discover relationships among all kinds of seemingly unconnected subjects. The result? Kids better equipped to tackle life's riddles creatively, and better able to think critically across disciplines.

Related Article: 3 Things You Didn't Know About Your Child's Brain

Corroborating research from the University of Notre Dame suggests that sleep may also benefit intelligence and creativity by providing the growing brain with a much-needed break from incoming information. The wonder of childhood is its novelty, but the brain craves uninterrupted time to process all that sensory data.

Conversely, inadequate sleep may beget learning problems that persist far into a child's future. The National Sleep Foundation has found that sleepiness makes it harder for kids to manage impulsivity and emotions in class. These symptoms can be mistaken for a learning disability such as attention deficit disorder, and over time, may cause a child to fall far behind.

In one NSF-cited experiment, children were sent to bed at a later-than-normal hour every night for a week. Then, the same kids were instructed to sleep at least 10 hours a night for another week. Teachers, who weren't privy to the schedules, reported far more problems when children had gone to bed later.

For better or worse, these effects may be long-term. Lack of adequate sleep is one of the surest predictors of underachievement in children and preadolescents, according to NSF. Kids are simply too exhausted to concentrate, grades slip, and learning spirals.

How much sleep is enough?

The science varies, but Notre Dame researchers suggest that 3-to-5-year-olds should get 11-13 hours per night, while school-aged children should sleep 10-11 hours.

Sources:

The National Sleep Foundation: http://sleepfoundation.org

Research study: "Human Relational Memory Requires Time and Sleep": www.pnas.org/content/104/18/7723.full.pdf+html

Harvard University Division of Sleep Medicine: healthysleep.med.harvard.edu

University of Notre Dame: http://news.nd.edu/news/16431-childrens-lack-of-sleep-can-mean-trouble-grasping-new-ideas-notre-dame-research-shows/