Ellie*, 15, gives us her perspective on lockdown, in her own words…
Keeping contact with my friends was really important, so I would face time the people in my group or when I was completing a lesson I would face time the friends I sat next to, to try and have some help with the work and also to try and make it more entertaining.
In lockdown I sometimes focused on less academic subjects when I was feeling really unmotivated. The subject that I used to do this was my textiles work as I would be doing something productive while also feeling like I wasn’t doing school work. I would also make a plan for the next day of what I was going to do. I would make a list of specific tasks for school work that I didn’t complete while also trying not to overload myself with too many things to do in 1 day.
One benefit from lockdown was the amount of time that I got to spend with my sisters. We would watch films and eat dinner and lunch together, as we wouldn’t normally do this that was one thing that would improve my moods.
As my mum was working on zoom and my sister was completing her degree I took on the role of cooking the family lunch and dinner or baking cakes or biscuits to give myself something productive to do that wasn’t school work when I needed a break. Movie night with my sister was also fun to do during lockdown
I struggled with the work load during lockdown, because they were constantly reminding us of how we were going to do exams after summer. To cope with this I would remind myself that I was doing my best and that after lockdown it would get easier to complete more work because I would feel more motivated.
As lockdown got more relaxed and I was able to meet with friends we decided to go river swimming as it was a way that we could hang out, do something fun and not very expensive while also remaing socially distanced.
*not her real name