How to choose lighting for a student?

When arranging a room or a study corner for a school-age child, we should first of all bear in mind the health and comfort of our child. In addition to ergonomic, age-appropriate and height-adjusted furniture, it is worth taking care of appropriate lighting that will enable learning at different times of the day and will not tire the child's eyesight.

Access to daylight

Ideally, the pupil's room or corner should be bright with large windows and therefore natural light. Unfortunately, we do not always have such possibilities. Nevertheless, let us try to make the best use of what we have. For students, access to daylight while studying is very important. We should arrange the arrangement of the furniture so that the study desk could stand as close to the window as possible, daylight is the best for our eyesight.

However, the truth is that from the beginning of the school year until spring, students do not benefit from much daylight. A necessary solution is a desk lamp, which will ensure optimal lighting of the workspace.

What study lamp?

There are many models and designs of lamps on the market, so it is worth considering what we care about and what possibilities we have.

• The perfect lamp should have adjustable armso that it can be properly set for the comfort of our child. The optimal distance from the illuminated surface is 35 cm, but sometimes we need to illuminate something better, then a movable arm is useful. Adjustable height means that the child, if necessary, changes the position of the lamp, not his back, i.e. he does not slouch when he has to see something accurately.
• The lamp should evenly illuminate the working space - it must be placed so that nothing obscures the book or notebook. This means that right-handers should have it on the left side of the desk, and left-handers - on the right side.
• Another important issue is type of bulb. Old type bulbs provide directional light, while modern ones: halogen or LED lamps give a soft light that is less tiring for the eyes. Halogen lamps have two major disadvantages, however: they get hot, which can be very unpleasant when a child touches the bulb, and they consume a lot more electricity than LED bulbs.
• It is also not without significance the color of the light. When choosing a lamp and a bulb, remember that the yellow / orange color has a relaxing and calming effect, but too warm light can put you to sleep. Cool, bluer in shade, the color has stimulating properties, but too bright and cold light sometimes causes irritation and makes it difficult to fall asleep. To illuminate the study area, it is worth choosing a light source with a color temperature of approx. 4000 K. So let the student choose LED bulbs with a bright light color for learning, and warm ones for sleeping.

• Bulb power the most suitable for learning is from 40 to 100 W.
• If the study desk is not too large, we may consider purchasing it a lamp that, instead of a base, has a clip, thanks to which we can attach it to the edge of the desk or the shelf above the desk. We then gain valuable centimeters on the countertop. There is also a lamp with space for school supplies at the base to save space.
• Some lamps are very practical functions of changing the light intensity and the choice of its color. The first function can be especially useful if the lamp is also to serve, for example, as muffled night lighting.
• Lamps can be powered by batteries, rechargeable batteries or simply plugged in. Let's choose the most optimal solution for us, think about how the child will use the lamp. If we decide to use a traditional power supply, remember that it should be at least 2 meters long, in case of necessity to move it.

More than one light source

Remember that the child, while learning, in addition to the lamp on the desk, should also have another light source on, e.g. overhead lighting or a lamp standing elsewhere in the room, so as to eliminate the contrast between the strong light at the desk and the dark in the rest of the room.

The Golden mean

Both too dim and too harsh, bright light can cause problems - not only discomfort, but even pain and deterioration of the quality of vision. Thanks to the optimally selected lighting of the study place, our children will not tire their eyesight or spoil it. Moreover, using a good light source helps to prevent fatigue and promotes better concentration while studying. When choosing, let's take into account the sensitivity to light, which is an individual matter and may be different for each of us.