Struggles and Coping Mechanisms

of Grade 11 Senior

High School

Student

Authors:

Carmen D. Ramirez

Khristelle Anne P. Gunay

Precious Anne L. Mendoza

Ricardo M. Dionido

April 2022

Chapter I
Introduction

The Covid-19 pandemic brought global problems in business,

environment, government, health, technology, and education. The

government here in the Philippines and abroad have closed all the

educational institutions to control the spread of disease that directly

impacted the students, educators, and academic institutions that brought

sudden shifts from the physical classroom to virtual learning that

disrupted many teachers and learners (Chandra,2020).

As a student we face many difficulties in this time. We are shocked

at the sudden change of education system here in our country. We are

used to face to face classes and it is a big challenge to us to cope with

the new learning system or we called as online and blended learning. We

spend our weekdays to school but now we spend our weekdays in home

to do activities and modules along with online class. Many students

experience some difficulties because they are not easily coped up with

this kind of situation.

We can't deny that our behavior has also change because of the

happenings around us that didn’t expect. Sometimes we started to

overthink on how can we finished our module on the right day and time.

We were able to spend our time in doing those activities. From time to

time sometimes we are stressed since some of the lessons of other

teachers' subjects are difficult to understand because you are not

connected to the internet. This can be misleading and misunderstanding

in some parts of the lesson when conducting online classes. Students

develop a coping mechanism to cope up and adapt this kind of learning

system today as well as how to handle those struggles.

According to Walker (2021), this virus has a profound influence on

our school system. The closure pushed the administrators to go online,

traditional face-to-face classes to flexible learning modalities, and

learners were pushed to enlists themselves in these new learning

modalities. These shifts from face-to-face to flexible learning modes

seem to an extraordinary obstacle added burden to the administrators,

teachers, parents, and learners every day.

According to Branquinho, et al (2020) there are factors that

standouts such as Biological Aspect in the form of headaches and

muscle pains; Psychological Aspect in the form of symptoms of

depression, anxiety, loneliness, longer screen time, and more substance

use; and Social Aspect that are inclined to increase of family conflicts

and disagreements, loss of important life moments, contacts, and social

skills.

The World Health Organization (WHO) and Morin et al. (2020)

opined that the COVID-19 Pandemic and the imposed social

confinement Have produced significant stress, anxiety, and worries

about health and the fear of being infected, jobs, and financial problems,

and uncertainty about the future. Worry, anxiety, and uncertainty are

common in children, and they may include feelings that are sometimes

close to those experienced by adults, such as a fear of death, a fear of

assistance.

If schools are closed as part of necessary interventions, children

will no longer have the sense of structure and excitement that the

environment provides, and they now have fewer chances to be with their

peers and gain the social support that is important for good mental

health. Along with this, Elmer, and Ellis et al. (2020) stipulate that

learner's levels of negative psychological state like anxiety, stress,

boredom, loneliness, and other depressive symptoms worsen compared

to pre-Covid time. COVID-19 stresses were related to more loneliness

and more depression, especially for adolescents who spend more time

on social media. Beyond COVID-19 stress, students experienced the

luxury of time connecting to their friends physically that help them cope

with their day-to-day issues in life. During the pandemic, this connection

among friends and families by the learner has been strained reason why

some experienced physical, social, and psychological issues.

Covid-19 Pandemic does not deal only with older people but also

with learners. Facing this pandemic gave every individual a roller coaster

kind of emotion. Adults do have fear for they are worried about how they

could overcome the situation considering the status of their family. While

the adults tend to find ways on how they could survive the day-to-day

chaos, the young people are very much involved too. Senior high

learners who are also affected experienced to feel mental health issues

as they are worried for their parents, family, and friends who are affected
and will be affected by the virus. They fear being infected and that some

learners can experience anxiety as they go on with their lives.

They are in struggle as they are isolated physically, which means

they are no longer allowed to attend their classes physically and

experience actual and technological matters at school. Some learners

experienced isolation as some were exposed to positive patients. In

isolation, they faced the battle, and questions whether they are infected

or not gave them the most fear. As everyone is suffering the effect of

Covid19 some of us showed the symptoms of the panic attack

biologically and psychologically. Some experienced headaches,

disturbed sleep patterns, diarrhea, chest pain, cough, body pain as the

manifestations of stress they are facing. The senior high school learners

are fragile and affected by the outcome of this pandemic as they worry

too much for their family and friends. This too much worry caused them

to be psychologically stressed that they experienced those symptoms

mentioned.

Coping may seem to be a simple word with a deeper meaning. The

word coping applies to every individual from birth to the geriatric stage of

life. As everyone fights their own battle most especially in this time of the

pandemic, coping is the best word to fight all the negative thoughts,

emotions, and physical struggle. The senior high school learners who

experienced this pandemic learned different ways to cope with the

experiences affecting their physical, psychological, and social aspects in

develop them to acquire a positive mindset.

This positivity enables one learner to look up to life facing Covid-19

differently. In that way, they were able to engage in different worthwhile

activities as part of their daily routine. Through them, they could spread

the positivity to their family and friends as a support system in a way that

this positivity will be returned to them. Aside from a positive mindset, one

should engage in worthwhile activities like engaging in better daily

routines and other normal through regular exercise, participating in-home

activities, singing and dancing, drawing, and other activities. Keep in

touch with loved ones daily via phone, e-mail, social media, video

conference, and the likes.

For the learner to succeed in their academic journey, the full

support of family and friends must be present. Teens and young adults

regard friendships, and engaging with peers is essential in the

developmental experiences of adolescents. A straightforward talk with

learners about being trapped at home with parents and family could be

helpful. Taking care of themselves will allow them to better care for

others. Being connected with friends and family especially during times

of social isolation is very important. Keeping up with regular daily

exercise, sleep at the right time, and eat healthy foods are important

techniques for staying safe and sound during the disruptions.

to identify the struggles of the students in the distance learning and

determine the stress coping mechanisms the students employed to cope

with these struggles.

Research Questions

This study aims to determine the Struggles and Coping

Mechanism of both Grade 11 Senior High School; students of Talumpok

Integrated School with the end view of proposing activities and analyzing

mechanism to further enhance the skills of students at the time of

pandemic. Specifically, this study seeks to answer the following

questions:

1. What is the level of coping mechanism of students during Covid-19

pandemic?

2. How does the pandemic affect the performance of the students?

3. What are the challenges encountered by the students in coping with the

changes brought by the pandemic?

4. Based on the findings of the study, what strategies can be done to

further strengthen the coping mechanism of the students?

Scope and Delimitation

The research study will be conducted to the Grade 11 Senior High

School students who cover up the struggles and coping mechanisms

during COVID 19 pandemic. The aspects investigated the performances,

adaptation and the problems and proposed solution for Grade 11 Senior

High School students dealing with problems or difficulties. This study will
only be conducted exclusively with the Grade 11 Senior High School

students, it is not available to the Grade 12 Senior High School students,

Teachers, Junior High students, and Elementary students because we

want to know on how Grade 11 Senior High School handle the situation

in facing struggles especially, we are preparing or starting to be prepared

in the college journey.

Significance of the Study

The findings of this study will be considered beneficial to the

following considering that coping mechanism plays an important role in

this time of new learning environment.

For students - this study will help the students who will need full

support in coping up on their struggles including their academic subjects’

requirements and projects, oral and written examinations, quizzes and

grade recitations and other academic activities that will develop their

skills in critical thinking. This will also be beneficial to them to adapt to a

new living environment, new peers, and sexual corners together with

their behavioral issues.

For teacher - This study will help the teacher to guide the students

from the learning difficulties that they might experience.

For school - This will help school to let the students have a peer

counseling that will benefit them from freely sharing their struggles and

issues about their academics.

For parents - This study will help the parents to assess their

children, in the struggles that they might experiencing at this time of

of the behavior of their children as a student who is adapting the new

environment and new learning system.

For future researcher - This study will serve as your basing in

conducting a study related with analyzing the struggles and coping

mechanism of g11 senior high school students during Covid 19

pandemic. It will also serve as your guide to some practices in improving

students’ academic performance.