Education during Pandemic

By Alanah

Friday the 13th of March 2020 I would've never thought it would be the most insane year of my life. The last day I attended school and mostly everyone else nationwide. Coronavirus hit everyone very differently and for everyone in school

It was very confusing and difficult to adjust to distance learning.

My last class of the year was 7th period english. We were all aware of it being our last day of school and talking about how much of a serious issue this is. Many of my classmates and teachers were worried about how it will affect us and our loved ones.

Distance learning surprised everyone in school, wondering how it's all going to work through a computer, a phone or any type of device that connects to wifi. According to the article Stand Together Foundation many students that are in low-income households had a hard time due to the fact that maybe they couldn't afford wifi or even a device to do school work on.

Many students also deal with depression and anxiety which may make it harder or easier for them to do distance learning. According to the article Gale database, Depression is a mood disorder characterized by feelings of lingering sadness or hopelessness, inactivity or restlessness, and difficulty in thinking and concentration. Students who suffer with depression have more of a difficult time menatlly with distance learning as in not having motivation to do work, signing into class or even a simple task like getting out of bed.

Anxiety according to the article Gale database is an unpleasant emotional state characterized by an often vague apprehension, uneasiness, or dread that is often accompanied by physical sensations similar to those of fear, such as perspiration, tightness of the chest, difficulty breathing or breathlessness, dry mouth, trembling, and headache. Unlike fear, in which the individual is usually aware of its cause, anxiety's cause is often not clear.

My friend Alyssa Parsad deals with both anxiety and depression and says, “I Feel isolated as I don't go out and when I do go out I'm limited to a certain amount of time because of the pandemic. I like it better because there's not as many social events that I have to worry about cause that's what triggers my anxiety.

An issue that I see that is happening a lot is students not doing group projects or contributing their time to help with group projects. Many students work with their camera off and teachers can’t see if they are working or just on their phone behind the computer screen. Teachers also put us into breakout rooms where there are 2 to 6 people either discussing the project or just sitting in silence hoping at least one person is doing something. Teachers can't do much because we are not at school, where as if we were at school they would make us participate.

Teachers are overloading us with work. We are on our computers from the moment we wake up till we go to bed or even later. Yes teachers are preparing our work and what we have to do throughout the week but we AREN'T robots you can’t give us all these assignments and expect us to finish them the day of.

I feel like what teachers don't understand

Grades getting better or worse for students. Many students are hands-on learners and don't get the one on one help bc teachers have limited time on zoom and need to help other students