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• 1 media/Screen Shot 2020-04-15 at 12.47.08 PM.png 2020-04-11T18:42:58-07:00 Teenagers (Ashrith Akkaraju) 25 This page will look at the perspective of adolescent kids under quarantine and how they are coping with quarantine plain 2020-05-01T18:09:58-07:00

  Fact Checked Source: "Teens Stuck At Home Because of The Corona Virus"

  
  On March 19, 2020, Buzzfeed News writers Rachel Sanders and Anne Helen Sanders wrote about how the teenage community is dealong with the coronavirus pandemic, more specifically, the quarantine imposed as a result of it and their time spent during it. Buzzfeed Article Link
  
  
  
  
   

  Looking Deeper: Five Facts Checked

  In order to better understand the article and how these teenagers look at the quarantine, I looked at five claims made across the different submissions by the teenagers' featured to see if they held any degree of truth.

  The truth is, lots of Mexicans don’t even know what COVID-19 is, so we started quarantining before it was required by the Mexican government 
  - Aiden, 13, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico

  After looking at the quote by Aiden, I copied and pasted it into google and it redirected me to an article titled "Mexico’s coronavirus-skeptical president is setting up his country for a health crisis" from Vox. In that article, it went over how President Andrés Manuel López Obrador told many Mexicans that they should not fear the coronavirus, despite the hundreds and thousands of cases at the time.

  The one silver lining to this situation is that at least the beaches won't be closed anytime soon.
  - Max Bielawski,17, Kahului, Hawaii

  Max mentions how beaches will not be closed anytime soon, especially as a resident of an island nation. Despite his predictions, the CDC guidelines state that all public social gathering areas will have to be closed for the time being and many news sites have come out with statements that states like Florida and California have closed down their beaches.

  And I don't know how many more people our world will lose to the virus called COVID-19.
  - Morgan Macdougal, 17, Lincolnville, Maine

  As of right now, after checking the coronavirus map on Google News, worldwide there are currently 3,002,303 confirmed cases, 878,818 recovered, and 208,131. According to Time Magazine, the death rate of coronavirus is only 3.4%, which isn't too bad.

  I really can't exercise during "quarantine."
  - Davis Norma Ouriel, 17, Los Angeles

  The physical therapy center Excelsior Orthopaedics gives tips on staying active and healthy during this quarantine period, which includes workouts that you can do everyday both indoor and outdoor, which range from pilates and weight lifting to jogging in your neighborhood, cycling, and dog walking. 

   I took my first day of online school pretty seriously, but by day two, my focus had waned. I deleted TikTok and Snapchat to try to keep the ball rolling with my projects, but my enthusiasm is fading
  - Natalie Radu, 17, Manalapan, New Jersey

  With different distractions around the house, it is hard to stay focused, especially in households with a lot of technological devices around, as apps tend to cause us to lose focus on our important things.

  Analytical Essay

  Being stuck at home sucks, especially during a time like this. However, there are different ways to cope up with it, especially teenagers, as they are hit the hardest in terms of socializing. The article Teens Stuck at Home Because Of The Coronavirus from Buzzfeed news is written mainly from the perspective of teenagers under lockdown as a result of the imposed quarantine on the nation. The perspective of the teenage mindset is shown a lot due to most of the article being excerpts from entries by various teens across the US, who have a position in society that is not influential yet but can be if they choose to use their minds collaboratively.
  
  In the article, it is clearly shown that the teenagers are very bored during quarantine and have run out of things to do by themselves, and can't wait to go back to hanging out with their friends and what not. COVID-19 has been affecting more and more people by that day, especially the younger people. While most adolescents are adamant to hang out with friends, they don’t realize that they can potentially risk carrying the disease and pass it on to the older people in their lives. This virus has been shown to be lethal, so therefore social distancing is what is keeping their lives safe right now. “I'm a senior, and I have been dreaming about the perfect second semester of my last year of high school for the entire time I've attended Interlochen” says 18-year old Noelle Johnson of Traverse City, Michigan. While the lockdown is hard for many adolescents, it is especially hard for seniors in high school since they will not be able to experience prom and graduation like the other seniors get to. Moreover, this quarantine is causing a rift in some families as some teens find their siblings to be distracting while taking classes or doing work. 
  
  Most of the teens writing in this article are writing it for other teens out there as well as adults to show their struggles of being an adolescent during quarantine. Furthermore, their use of testimonials to emotion work for them as it shows that light innocence of being a growing child while amidst a serious situation such as a pandemic. Moreover, the contributors to the article have similar yet very different viewpoints on ways to spend their quarantine, as well as what to do about the situation. Annie Fox, the author of Too Stressed to Think offers her wisdom on things to do while in a state of mental lockdown for teens, when they are having dull thoughts. She includes 3 main things to do: “Think about it, talk about it, and write about it” (Fox, pg. 17). Her tips for coping with depressive situations and feelings are aimed at the teenage audience and focused on helping them to make the best of any situation. Facts from behavior specialists like Annie Fox and doctors regarding guidelines on how to deal with lockdowns and stay safe are what teens look for, but definitely not their parents advice. Most teenagers are usually out for themselves, but the quarantine has forced them to become more collaborative minded and listen to each other and build each other up. While lunchtime in american schools is usually looked over and kind of a stress-reliever from classes, facetime lunch sessions with friends have been put into effect by teenagers as they miss that social aspect.
  
  In conclusion, while being in quarantine is hard, especially as a doctor/medical professional or even otherwise, being in quarantine as a teen is even harder as they have to battle their inner demons while also coming up with creative ways to cope and even help their peers cope with the crisis ongoing around them.
   

  References

  Fox, A. (2005). Too Stressed to Think?: A Teen Guide To Staying Sane When Life Makes You Crazy. Free Spirit This author,

  Annie Fox, holds an m.Ed (masters of education degree). Additionally she is a parenting expert, family coach, and trusted online advisor for teens. She writes books for parents on how to deal with family issues as well as teens on how to deal with changes in life. Fox uses various testimonials of teenagers in order to protray the stresses in their life as a basis for her to provide solutions to them. In addition, she uses scenarios in the book in order to better protray how to tackle the situation involving stress as if she were in the mindset of a teenager. She also includes links to government approved sites for teens to find out how to deal with specific stress related issues in the index section. The thesis of this book is that while stresses are abundant in life, especially the life of the teen, there are many easy ways to tackle them in order to move forward unhindered as well as the choice to become a better person is in our hands. The author begins by introducing the topic of stress in the teenage life, then moves forward into including quotations from teal-life teens on their stress (school, work, family, etc.) that they have in their life and her methods to defeating it. Moreover, she includes fake scenarios in which teens are involved in order to show a problem solving method for each stress she talks about. This source will provide additional insight into the mindset of teens in quarantine because due to the switch to online schooling, many teens are finding it harder to focus in a place filled with various distractions that they did not have in school as well as the added stress of having to spend time with family and adjust to everyone elses schedules at home.

  Sanders, R. , Peterson, A. (2020, March 19). Teens Stuck at Home Because Of Coronavirus. Buzzfeed News. Retrieved From https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/rachelysanders/teens-teenagers-at-home-isolation-coronavirus-school

  This source is a primary source from Buzzfeed news, which is a news and media entertainment company, which focuses on news information distribution and media information. The perspective is first person because while the main article itself is published by Rachel Sanders and Anne Helen Peterson, two reporters at Buzzfeed, the majority of the article is excerpts from different teenagers across the US writing about their experiences during quarantine and more specifically what activities they have been up to and their reaction to the coronavirus. The main purpose of this source is to provide views on ways to spend your time during quarantine from the mindset of a teenager. The authors that penned this article start off by how the lives of everyone were turned upside down overnight, especially teenagers. The article then goes into depth by highlighting a section for each kid that had submitted their entry to the article and their excerpt along with pictures of them are shown to provide the angle from which the article is showing the experience of quarantine. I think the source will provide good evidence since most teens feelings regarding staying at home and sucking it up from hanging out with friends in person is embodied a lot in the article and will make a great resonance with the teen crowds.