The Effect of Virtual Learning on a Teenager
By: Anthony Olivares
Tags: Teenagers, Quarantine, Self Improvement, High School, 5amclub

Photo by Gabriel Benois on Unsplash

Have you ever heard of white room torture? It is when a person is placed into a completely white room, with white light, only eating white rice on white plates, and wearing only white clothing. In addition to this, the room is mute, completely devoid of all sound except for the sounds of the prisoner himself. This may not seem so bad, but after a few months, prisoners could not remember their mother's face, how their father sounded, or if they even had any siblings at all. This is caused by extreme sensory deprivation, which causes the mind of the prisoner to effectively flip upon itself and succumb to the only voice and color in the room, the dark thoughts that have lain dormant up until this room.

I wouldn’t say social distancing is this depraved form of torture used by governments, but it may seem like that for many teenagers. Some used school as a safe haven, a place where they can learn away from their abusive parents, dysfunctional household, or no access to electronics or a stable internet connection. No one really misses school until it is gone, especially these children.

But, I digress.

I am here to talk about teenagers like me: relatively normal household, access to the internet, and access to an electronic device to actually be able to attend classes now. We have it kind of great, actually. COVID-19 has caused us to become more resourceful, more independent, but most of all, lazier.

Never has there been more reason to sleep until 3 minutes before your class, and so for the first period at 8:30 am, all I see are black screens with the names of my classmates on them, save for my poor teacher who has to talk to a load of students with faces that are comprised of their name over a black square. Imagine trying to teach AP Spanish Literature to a load of squares who occasionally answer “Yessir” or “Yep.”

Teenagers today are more resourceful. We can find many, many ways to avoid doing work. Instead of attending class, maybe our “internet connection was not working,” or “my tablet is broken.” The days of forging a sick letter to the school are gone. It is too easy now, leading to a huge problem: we are no longer getting the information we need to learn. It is too easy to simply cheat off the internet, not go to class, and sleep during lectures that even the valedictorians, AP students, and class pets are doing it. It is partially our fault, of course, but can you blame a load of teenagers whose brains are not fully developed yet? Didn’t think so.

Now, I am not one to call out every single problem that exists in our society and offer no solutions. There are, of course, solutions to every problem. Although, the ones I have employed in my own life are in no way, shape, or form easy.

After months of kind of breezing through school, it is time for the semester finals for me. I am an AP student with rigorous courses and college applications — I am used to this kind of thing. Although, I have (for the first time in my life) been taken off guard by the amount of work I have to complete in a short time frame to be able to pass the class. After a lack of motivation, burning out from college applications, I have been neglecting my work, deciding to find some “help” from the internet at times for my assignments. Now, it has caught up. Finals are coming in, there are more methods of a school detecting academic dishonesty, and the questions are getting harder.

I have completely changed my entire routine, and if you have a teenager in your home, I would suggest that you help them create something similar.

First off, I have started to plan my day every morning. As soon as I wake up at 5 am, I am on my computer, on Apple’s calendar, and setting out time blocks for the rest of the day until 9:00 pm, when I get ready for bed.

A regular Wednesday and Thursday on my Apple Calendar.

Yes, I am waking up at 5 am to do work. I am a tad different from the usual teenager. But, I digress.

As I said, I plan my day, and it usually starts off with a 3–4 mile run. Most AP students do not realize the academic growth exercise has on them, but I have finally found the key to success: random workouts throughout the day to remind myself how great sitting in my chair at school is.

(Not really, it gets the blood flowing. It is hell, though.)

I then shower and get something productive done before my first class, which is usually at 8:30 am unless it is a Wednesday, which starts at 9 am. This may be reading 100 Years of Solitude, or working on the website I own for my tutoring business at gradelifttutoring.com (shameless advert). Nonetheless, this is the time I have to create, to express myself, or to simply lay back and read a nice book.

Then, classes commence. I have started turning my camera on (no matter how bad my bedhead is), in order to stay awake during class. Again, if you have a teenager in your home, ensure they are doing this if you want that tuition to be put to use.

After classes, I start my 2nd workout of the day. This is usually lifting weights, as I have gained an excessive amount of weight (43 pounds) this quarantine and I am hoping to convert at least some of that into muscle. I plan to appear as if I was sculpted from marble by the hands of Michaelangelo, but having less of a muffin top will do me just fine.

After that, I either have a tutoring session to go to (gradelifttutoring.com), or can focus on homework, studying, website work, and blogging on said website (which is, again gradelifttutoring.com. Okay, I am done now).

During quarantine, my business has seen more clients than ever before. I invested some money I have made into adequate software and a drawing tablet, so digital sessions are as comprehensive as ever. I am finally getting into the groove of adult-ing.

Anyways, quarantine has been bad for all of us. We are getting lazier, fatter, and definitely more aware of how dirty everything was before this. It has had a pretty bad impact on teenagers, but I finally am getting unused to this new life we have to live. If we are ever allowed to get out of the house, I may just be sad about leaving my trusty desk chair. We’ll see.

Maybe quarantine isn’t a white room. It has some color to it after all.