Stressed+Out

toc What causes Americans to be so stressed?
 * __Stressed Out__**  By Nicole Heytink, Tayler Hehir, Allyson Solvang, Kelsey Hehir, and Lauren Karow
 * Essential Questions**

Teaches people how to identify the causes of stress How people can deal with their stress?
 * Challenge**

**Guiding Questions**
What can we do to reduce your stress? How much homework do you get a night? What expert opinions did we find on stress? Does lack of sleep effect your stress level? What kind of stress do teenagers have?

**Guiding Activities**
Survey Use internet to find statistics Ask Guidance Counselor Parents Questions we asked the students of Pascack Valley 1.) How many people get 8-9 hours of sleep on school days? 2.) How many people get 5-7 hours of sleep on school days? 3.) How many people get 5 or less hours of sleep on a school day? 4.) How many people spend over 2 hours doing homework? 5.) How many people spend less than 2 hours doing homework? 6.) How many people do afterschool activities or sports? 7.) How many people have a job? 8.) How many people feel play a sport?

**Guiding Resources**
Some websites found about stress: 1. __@http://www.uic.edu/depts/wellctr/docs/Stress%20and%20the%20College%20Student.pdf __ 2. @http://www.mystressmanagement.net/articles/student-stress-in-college.html 3.__@http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/02/californias-recession-and-education-cuts-are-stressing-students-to-the-breaking-point-with-many-reporting-that-they-can-n.html __ 4.__@http://sundial.csun.edu/2011/04/student-stress-on-the-rise/ __ 5.__@http://helpguide.org/mental/stress_signs.htm __ Asking Guidance counselor

From our **survey** we concluded the following:


1. How many people get 8-9 hours of sleep? (8) 2. How many people get 5-7 hours of sleep? (36) 3. How many people get 5 or less hours of sleep? (10) 4. How many people spend less than 2 hours doing homework? (25) 5. How many people spend 1-2 hours of doing homework? (38) 6. How many people have a job? (17) 7. How many people do after school activities? (29) 8. How many people play a sport? (40)

__**NOTES**__
9/15/11- Today the project was introduced to us and we formed our group and thought about ideas we could use. 9/16/11- Today we figured out the main topic we would use for our project, which was Stressedout. We worked on the Essential Questions, Guiding Questions, Guiding Activities, and Challenge during class and finished it for homework over the weekend. 9/19-9/20 We went around asking people our guiding activities questions. Made graph for homework. 9/20/11- We found websites for our guiding resources 9/21-9/22- We went around video taping people for our imovie. 9/23/11- We divided up parts for the solution essay to do for homework. 9/26/11- We discussed our solutions, and how we are going to present our project. 9/27/11- PRESENT!!!!!!

__**Solutions**__ :
Watch this video to learn about stress-http://www.helpguide.org/toolkit/quick_stress_relief_video.htm

Some people have more stress then others but every person has stress. We have found many ways that you can relieve stress. For example, we found that according to the information; drinking less caffeine, increasing physical activity, and maintaining a well-balanced diet can lower your stress level. Other ideas for decreasing your stress levels are going for a walk, meditation, yoga, and deep breathing exercises. These activities are examples of relaxation and if they are done regularly, they will help reduce your everyday stress level. It will also improve your feelings and your ability to stay calm when under pressure. We found that even though you can't get rid of stress completely, you can still reduce stress. It is important to reduce stress because it makes your life easier, and can reduce less problems.

There are so many reasons that people have stress, and it can happen to people of all different ages. One of the main causes of stress for teenagers is homework. Homework is given almost every night. Students have after school activities, sports, and jobs that they have to do after school. This causes stress because when they get home from all their activities they have to start their hw. For example, school sports. They start practice at 3:30 and don't end till almost 6. When they get home they have to start their hw, eat dinner and then they feel like relaxing. They don't have enough time to sleep due to all the homework and projects combined with the activities. They then become stressed and don't know how to manage their time to get everything done.

When we talked to the guidance counselor, she told us about the many things that students come to her about and what she does to help them. Students come to her stressed about homework/projects, signing up for PSAT/SAT, and applying for college. She then helps them manage their time, tells them to go to relaxation classes like yoga, and go to bed early. When we asked the adults about their stress, most of them said that it was their job, money problems, and doing everything at once while helping their kids too. There is not really a way to reduce the stress of an adult as much as there is for a child because our stress is mostly school wise, and the adults stress is real life situations due to the economy.

One big part of stress has to do with lack of sleep. Teenagers are supposed to get at least 8-9 hours of sleep and a lot of teenagers either oversleep or don’t get enough of it. We decided to experiment with the students at Pascack Valley to see if kids get the right amount of sleep. With our results, we decided that if kids would just go to bed at least 2 hours earlier than it would reduce the stress. Also kids use their computers and watch tv so much and they dont get enough time to relax and then go to bed early enough. If kids would just reduce the time they spend on watching TV or on the computer and go to bed instead, it would give their brain more time to rest and they wouldn’t be so stressed. Also if teens are stressed, they usually wont get enough sleep because they’re worrying all night and can't rest. When you get enough sleep, your brain works at its best, so when the brain is rested, it works better, reducing stress. If you have trouble sleeping at night you could always contact your doctor and get the help you need.

Teenagers may suffer from stress due to after school activities. Ways to help your child control their after school activities is to make sure that they definitely want to play the sport or do whatever they are doing after school. Also sometimes as adults you want your child to do more then what they are capable of doing due to time and commitment. To much after school activities will lead to less time to do your homework and then less time to sleep. With little time to do homework it can cause a teenager to work quickly (plagiarism) and not gain anything out of it. We are not telling you to stop playing a sport but to manage your time correctly so you are not stressed from to many things going on in your life.

Every grade has different types of stress due to different reasons. We think that freshman have the most stress on the first day of school because they are new, they don't know how to get around, and they stress over the homework load difference from eighth grade. For sophomores, it is the easy year. Once you feel comfortable and know the work effort needed to succeed you can relax more and manage your time. Personally, because we are all juniors this year, we think that it is the hardest year of all. We think this because its the year you have to start preparing for college and the grades that the colleges see. Also we have to take the SATs and the work load is increased. Senior Year is is the time that you have to get prepared and know what college you want to go to and what you want to do with the rest of your life. Seniors learn to mature, now that they are coming into the "real world."