I can’t wait to get back to my school
WHEN I heard my school was going to close because of the lockdown, like every other child in the country I was excited. I thought home schooling would be great: I could study according to my own schedule, eat and drink when I like, but still complete my work. What could be better than not having to get up at the crack of dawn every morning and rushing out of the house to go to school? Heaven! Or so I thought. For the first few weeks, it was enjoyable, but then the novelty started to wear off. Home schooling started to feel like normal school. It drags and there is not much excitement. Now don’t get me wrong, I enjoy getting stuck into lessons. But the lockdown has made me realise how much students take their teachers for granted. If I’m stuck on a piece of work at home, I can’t just put up my hand and have the teacher there at my side to answer my query. I have to send a message or email and can’t expect an instant response. This has been one of the hardest challenges. As someone who’s not the brainiest kid in the class, I find myself asking for help several times each lesson and when it takes a while to get the answers, I can’t complete the task. I am sociable and used to enjoy seeing my friends every day, so I’ve found it hard not being able to see them at all. The only contact we have with each other is through texts and FaceTime. Teens being teens, sometimes it takes my friends hours to reply or they never come back to me. It has been really hard to adjust. It doesn’t matter how many messages I send, whether it’s ‘Hey!’ or ‘What have you been doing today?’, it’s not the same as speaking face to face. It wasn’t long before I felt trapped inside the four walls of my home. When I go out, it is only round the block with one of my parents. As a teenager, I feel as if I have lost my independence. Covid-19 has changed the way we all live, no matter how old we are. It has given us all a well-needed reality check, whether that is good or bad. The way we live when we come out of this will be very different to how it was before. No one knows where we will be next year or even next week. The biggest thing playing on everyone’s mind is the uncertainty. We don’t knows what’s going to happen next and that’s scary. The main thing I will take away from this experience is the loneliness and isolation I have felt. But I also know this isn’t just something I’ve experienced. I’m not alone in how I’m feeling.
JAMES SPOERRY, 15,
Sittingbourne, Kent.