School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents • Hacker News Board

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#161

Post by dagmx » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:27 PM UTC

vertnerd wrote: post #154

I taught high school remotely in the spring of 2020 and I thought it was wonderful. Medical professionals reported a large uptick in mental health issues for teens and consequently our district will probably never close like that again (but think of the children!). From my perspective, however, I noted that many of my students who were miserable in school due to social issues flourished during the shutdown. Personall…

One thing I've noticed (obviously completely anecdotal) in the workplace is the vocality of who's suffering during the pandemic is biased heavily to extroverts.

The introverts never mention how they feel until directly asked and they usually like the new arrangement better

So in meetings it often creates a biased sense of everything being bad, but actual surveys of the employees paints a different picture.

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#162

Post by JPKab » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:35 PM UTC

ModernMech wrote: post #156

JPKab wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://gbdeclaration.org/ I'm terribly sorry for what happened to you. It shouldn't have happened. After the first few months the data was very clear that schools were safe to open. They absolutely shouldn't be closed right now. You are a victim of cowardly bureaucrats and powerful and wealthy elderly people who desperately want to cling to more years of their lives despite already being at the end. They don't care…

> When you see people walking around outside wearing masks, know that they have bought into a foolish lie completely removed from any form of science. It's 19F outside right now. I wear a mask outside because it keeps my face warm. No idea why people haven't been doing this all along. That you just assume everyone wearing a mask outdoors is a rube says more about you than them. Your post isn't being downvoted by fool…

As if I was talking about people in winter conditions wearing gaiters or actual ski masks to protect from the cold.

Wearing surgical masks outdoors in normal temperatures is not based in science. It's theoretical at best, but there's never been any data to refute the fact that almost all transmission occurs within households and enclosed public places. It's just fearful people calming their anxiety with something that does as much good as a copper bracelet or a crystal amulet. It's a great way for politicians to "show action", by mandating them outside in large cities after they have imposed indoor masks mandates, but still have rising cases.

Sorry I offended you by criticizing a superstitious ritual to appease the pagan god of covid.

And yes I have no business assuming that people wearing surgical masks on hiking trails in 70° weather are doing it because of the virus. I'm sure many of them are wearing it to keep their faces warm, because that totally makes sense. /s

Regardless I'd be willing to tolerate this stupidity if the schools were kept open. A little performative superstition is a price I'm willing to pay to keep kids in school. I'll wear copper bracelet, turquoise necklaces, crucifixes, whatever it takes to keep kids in school.

Kids sitting indoors isolated from their peers in front of computer screens is not a good thing. You didn't comment on that at all.

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#163

Post by JPKab » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:38 PM UTC

seoulbran wrote: post #121

JPKab wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://gbdeclaration.org/ I'm terribly sorry for what happened to you. It shouldn't have happened. After the first few months the data was very clear that schools were safe to open. They absolutely shouldn't be closed right now. You are a victim of cowardly bureaucrats and powerful and wealthy elderly people who desperately want to cling to more years of their lives despite already being at the end. They don't care…

Could not agree more... strong post. Moved from Chicago to Texas in 2020 and have been grateful for in-person schooling from the onset of the move. Watching my son's 60 year old 1st grade teacher stumble through hours of zoom was what did it for me. Sadly, fear porn still has concerned parents forcing their kids to mask up, outdoors - even in Texas. My heart breaks for them.

Having been to various parts of Texas in the summertime on numerous occasions, I can't imagine what it's like to have to wear a mask outdoors as a child.

Glad you made the move and it sounds like you're enjoying it.

Are you in the Austin area?

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#164

Post by desktopninja » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:47 PM UTC

Fascinating. Just from the title, would have expected the total opposite: Adolescents not sleeping properly because they are indoors too much and on the screen all day. Also generally degraded personal hygiene (dental mostly) because of the later reason.

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#165

Post by thethimble » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:47 PM UTC

sporklpony wrote: post #141

There was a movement in my town to push back school start times. However, there are some non-immediately-obvious consequences. Due to limited school buses, school start times need to be staggered, so the options were either to push all school start times back or swap school start times so adolescents start later and younger students start earlier. Pushing all start times back would have resulted with some schools end…

But wouldn’t you have the same problem if you kept the times as is? Is this because parents are unavailable to drop their kids off?

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#166

Post by lozenge » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

maximus-decimus wrote: post #134

AuthorizedCust wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would hesitate at using that book. Riddled with errors or non-factual stuff. Been discussed previously here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21546850

I bought the latest version and he seems to have addressed the problems brought up there. All books are gonna have errors especially in their first version. Doesn't mean it's better to just never read anything about any subject.

It's not really a case of typos or the odd error, more like a disinterest in the truth and a preference to just write a narrative and sprinkling fake citations to make it look scientific.

Just the first person to really review it, found 15 major errors and inaccuracies in the first chapter, and gave up due to the time it would take to review the rest of the book.

On top of that, the author doubles down when called out, and doesn't want to discuss any of the actual details or admit any errors or misrepresentations, like cutting data out of a graph when it would give readers a different conclusion than the text.

Some of the errors are positively dangerous, like claiming that the recommended number of hours of sleep is 8, instead of the true figure of 7-9.

"I spent more than 130 hours over the last 2 months researching and writing this essay (~5 hours to write the outline; ~60 hours to get to the first draft; ~65 hours to edit and fact-check), which constituted essentially all of my surplus free time over this time period. Continuing at the same pace, it would take me more than 3,000 hours to check the entire book. 3,000 hours is the equivalent of 75 weeks or 1.4 years of full-time work."

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#167

Post by ModernMech » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:54 PM UTC

This article shows there are positive and negative consequences to remote learning. It would be a mistake to see only the negative consequences, and then to insist that we return to the old way of doing things, which also had negative aspects. We have to admit that everything is different now regarding education. The future won't look like May 2020, but it also won't look like 2019 and prior either.

Forcing the issue on teachers is proving to be very bad for morale. Already, they were overworked and underpaid, but now they are being called lazy, their profession is being reduced to "babysitting", they are being demonized as anti-American and traitors, they are being harassed by parents who claim they are teaching their children socialist propaganda and pushing liberal agendas, school boards meetings have broken out into fisticuffs... it's getting to be too much.

You can see evidence of this on the /r/teachers forum, which as of late has been a sea of negative posts in what used to be a pretty positive place. This has gotten enough attention that it was covered recently in the media [0].

Forbes notes that 48% of teachers are thinking of quitting during a time when there's already a teacher shortage [1]. I would not be surprised to see a mass exodus of teachers if things get worse. My school district was closed last week because there weren't enough substitute teachers to handle all of the students. For some districts, even a single teacher quitting would mean an entire school would have to close.

The way forward is not backward. We need a new model that embraces positive aspects of remote and in person. We have to redefine what school is and is not. School cannot be a place where parents send their kids so that they are free to work. That can't be what it is for.

I really liked an idea I saw which is probably impractical, but interesting nonetheless. The idea was to cut the work week to 4 days and turn substitute teaching into something like jury duty; once a month, you've got to go into school and teach or assist a teacher. I like this idea because it brings more community involvement into schools, which I think is missing now in our society.

[0] https://news.yahoo.com/inside-rteachers-the-reddit-forum-whe...

[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/markcperna/2022/01/04/why-educa...

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#168

Post by ModernMech » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 4:59 PM UTC

JPKab wrote: post #162

ModernMech wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you see people walking around outside wearing masks, know that they have bought into a foolish lie completely removed from any form of science. It's 19F outside right now. I wear a mask outside because it keeps my face warm. No idea why people haven't been doing this all along. That you just assume everyone wearing a mask outdoors is a rube says more about you than them. Your post isn't being downvoted by fool…

As if I was talking about people in winter conditions wearing gaiters or actual ski masks to protect from the cold. Wearing surgical masks outdoors in normal temperatures is not based in science. It's theoretical at best, but there's never been any data to refute the fact that almost all transmission occurs within households and enclosed public places. It's just fearful people calming their anxiety with something tha…

I'm not talking about a gaiters and ski masks situation. I'm talking about a normal winter day, walking down the street, wearing a normal standard cloth mask. It keeps my face warm and I like it. If you assume I or others are doing it because of covid, it just a reflection of your personal biases.

> Kids sitting indoors isolated from their peers in front of computer screens is not a good thing. You didn't comment on that at all.

In my experience as a teacher, some of my students flourished in this setting, others did not. It's not a good thing in some ways, it's a good thing in other ways (hence this article). If you want to see more of my thoughts on this see my other post I just wrote.

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#169

Post by rkk3 » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 5:11 PM UTC

ErikVandeWater wrote: post #35

Why haven't schools been opening later in the day already since the science has been clear for years that opening later would improve learning? Schools could at least give the option of "early-bird" and "late-bird" like I had in elementary school.

Because improving learning outcomes is only 1 of the jobs schools have. Providing public child care and supervision is another main one and there priorities can conflict.

Re: School closures led to more sleep and better quality of life for adolescents

#170

Post by LightG » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 5:13 PM UTC

Same with WFH during the pandemic. My sleep quality was incredible and quality of life was through the roof.

My @sshole boss plucked us all back into the office just before Xmas and I'm back where I started.

Note: if you're a boss and hate your staff being WFH, some of us hate you right back and will be looking for a new job. Factor that into your bullsh!t policies and untrustworthiness.

(Yes, I've had a bad week).