Adjusting to New Ways of Learning
After speaking with multiple students, a pattern has occurred. They feel that quarantine has drastically affected their ability to learn as well as comprehend things. These students were asked multiple questions such as “what are struggling with after going back to school post quarantine?” Sophomore Abby Weigand expressed that because she is a hands on person and learns best when she’s interacting with others, she is struggling with her online classes as there is not as much opportunity to connect with others. Another question that these students were asked is “how do you think your ability to comprehend topics and get work done was affected due to quarantine?” Cali Fusely a senior at clarke says, “Over quarantine, it was hard to learn when trying to teach myself. Some of the classes needed extra explanations in what was going on and the teachers were not helpful when giving the information. It was hard to comprehend online classes and coming back to school is harder because of the teaching styles that are now being put into practice. I am a very hands on learner and with COVID, everyone has to be six feet apart and it is hard to understand sometimes with the masks on.” Another Senior, Alex Lee expressed that he as well felt that because classes are online it is harder to understand what is actually being taught due to the fact that you are almost teaching yourself because there is no in class participation. A common theme that occurred in answers to some of the questions was that because of quarantine, they procrastinate much more. Alex Lee says, “I definitely find school to be more difficult because it is far easier to procrastinate on homework.” Avery Abbas, a sophomore also feels this way, “I think being in quarantine has given me lots of distractions, so getting work done has been much more difficult. It also has caused me to procrastinate a lot because online assignments feel like they are never really there.”
Students feel that post quarantine they find themselves procrastinating more and find it harder to focus when in class. Also now that life is different and we are learning online, they often need to teach themselves or find themselves struggling because there is no real interaction.
43 out of 50 states issued stay at home orders during March 2020, this is when a 2 week stay at home order turned into over a month long “quarantine”. Schools shut down and switched to online learning and everything about life changed. Now that school has resumed, nothing is the same. Some classes are online and some classes are held in person or are even hybrid courses meaning some days you meet in person and some days you attend online. But after being stuck in your home for over a month with nothing to do, our brains will need to adjust to being thrown back into school.
