Being a high school student in 2023 is about having relationships with my peers in a novel way that outsiders might not have imagined. In this era of new technological innovations, including social media and online video chats, making connections with peers is done in interesting circumstances and spaces.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, students started online high school. Classes took place on Zoom and Google Meet. The closest to one-on-one interactions were in breakout rooms, which was a video chat with 2 or 3 other students, consisting of awkward interactions and little to no talking. Without the social aspect of in-person school, many teenagers felt isolated during the pandemic.
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This era of new technology creates connections between classmates in the digital world, but not necessarily in the classroom. With social media, connections are sped up, talking over text or Snapchat happens daily, but conversations in person happen less. You may talk to someone all night, but not even glance at them in class. This scenario is normal for high schoolers today. More relationships between students are forming through social media. Online conversation is more comfortable for students because it is less threatening to look at a bubble of text, rather than another person.
Social Media also creates benefits in the classroom. Specifically during group projects, contacting peers about meeting times or clarification on the project is simple and works instantly. Some students even use social media with teachers, while this is often frowned upon, many students prefer to ask questions this way instead of email because teachers tend to check their phones more often than their computers.
Despite the setback of Covid-19, high school students today are connecting with each other more than ever. It may not appear this way to adults, but the use of social media helps with school work, as well as creating relationships with peers
The title of the essay was very intriguing and made me want to dive in deeper to the insightful tect. Despite the comfortability of talking behind a screen, I wonder if this is a positive or negative change to our lives? Would our lives as students be the same without the pandemic? Maybe you could polish the introduction and conclusion and just make it a little more speicific to the argument as it was kind of hard to follow at the beginning.
I really like how you focused on something positive that came out of the pandemic, especially since it was a negative time for so many people. How do you think social media impacted the learning aspect of school, as well as the social? I think that a way to improve this essay is to expand more on how online only interactions are impacting students.