When I woke up from the sleep, it was already dark.
Tips
usage
As jiào, 觉 is a noun meaning 'a sleep' and pairs with the measure word 场 or 个. The flagship compound is 睡觉 (literally 'sleep a sleep'); other everyday forms are 午觉 (noon nap), 懒觉 (lazy lie-in), and 回笼觉 (back-to-bed nap after the alarm).
grammar
Watch the separable verb-object pattern: 睡觉 splits, so quantity and modifiers slot between the two halves — 睡了一个好觉 'slept a good sleep', 睡个午觉 'take a nap'. The jiào half is the noun being slept.
Bottom 'see' radical (Kangxi #147) — simplified from 見. The radical motivates the perception reading jué (see the separate entry); the jiào 'sleep' reading is filed under the same radical only because it shares the glyph, not the eye-sense.
semantic
⺍xiǎo
small (top dots form)
Top three short strokes — the compressed top form of 小. For the jiào 'sleep' reading the visible structure carries no meaning — the sleep sense is a rebus borrowing, sharing the glyph but not its perception logic.
Middle cover-shape, a horizontal canopy with downward hooks at each end. Easy memory hook for the jiào reading: a blanket pulled over the eye below for sleep.
