In the first two thirds of my career in secondary or high school teaching, none of my pupils had mobile phones. However, in the last ten years that changed. Phones were creeping in. My school made a policy that if youngsters were caught using mobile phones in classrooms then teachers should confiscate them.
It was perhaps twenty five years ago when I was teaching a Year 8 class one morning. I was speaking to them from the front when I heard a mobile phone go off in somebody's bag. Of course this interrupted my talk and everybody's attention was diverted.
A girl in the middle of the room took the phone from her bag and began to answer the call. I stood in front of her and said, "Give me that phone now please!". The girl refused and said, "It might be important. It's my mum!" And I said, "I don't care who's calling just give me that phone now!" With great reluctance and with the eyes of her classmates watching, she handed over the phone and was soon blubbering in her seat.
Later the mother contacted the school to complain that I had confiscated the phone and her daughter had been upset by the incident.
In a senior staff meeting a few weeks later, I argued that mobile phones were insidious in classrooms and needed to be stopped. The way that one or two of the other participants responded made it clear that they did not share my opinion. Perhaps they thought I was becoming an old fuddy duddy and needed to catch up with modern times.
Since those early days, mobile phones and smartphones have caused many unwelcome incidents and concerns within schools, including:-
- deliberately winding up teachers in order to film them having angry outbursts
- messaging other pupils in threatening ways (i.e. bullying)
- calling unsavoury outside characters to enter the school with a view to meting out punishment
- up-skirting photography and making other imagery of a sexual nature
- cheating during tests and exams
- simple distraction - checking out social media etc. instead of paying attention to teaching and learning.
- losing expensive phones or having them snatched by other pupils
I am sure that my list is not exhaustive.
Of course the horse bolted long ago but I was delighted yesterday to read this headline:-
I don't think smartphones should be in a classroom either, far too distracting.
ReplyDeleteThis would be true of adults but with teenagers it is even more true.
DeleteI was lucky to miss the age of phones but I did experience the cap wearing in classrooms. Same thing. They could take the cap off or lose it. Most kids took the cap off but sometimes it mysteriously got back on the head.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, hats should not be worn indoors - not just in schools.
DeleteThe prevalence and mis-use of phones and the attitudes of students, parents and administration are what chased me from the classroom.
ReplyDeleteTeaching is hard enough without that kind of intrusion.
DeleteSchool classrooms are no place for mobile/smartphones - for too much of a distraction. In my opinion, this is just one place that their use should be constrained - I would also add restaurants, theatres, concerts etc.
ReplyDeleteGood! We can be grumbling old men together!
DeleteNo one talks any more; no one watches where they're going any more; people think they're phone is the most important thing in the world.
ReplyDeleteI'm up for confiscating all phones.
Along with the software and apps they have been designed to get people hooked.
DeleteYou were and are absolutely correct. (for once)
ReplyDeleteI am deliriously happy to discover that at long last you have agreed with something I said Bruce!
DeleteLOL!
DeleteOf course they should not be used in a classroom but maybe access could be granted at lunch time? The logistics of every student checking in and out a phone twice a day seems impractical though. Thinking further, it is a good opportunity for students to learn the niceties of public phone use.
ReplyDeleteSlopping them might be impossible but they do not belong in school classrooms.
DeleteI am not disagreeing with you. Phones should not be in the classroom. If a parent needs to get in touch with their child, they can call the office and have a message sent- same way as it used to be.
ReplyDeleteI know that I rely on my phone too much but I swear to you- I don't know what I'd do without it as my brain develops tiny holes where the things are leaking out. I also love it for its ability to allow me to be in touch with my children in group texts or personal texts. In group texts we can all chime in, exchange photos, make plans.
There is so much more. But I absolutely do understand your position on phones in the classroom.
Like King Canute, I could never hold back the phones. Sometimes in theatres they make a point of asking people to switch off their phones and all theatregoers know that ringing phones can spoil theatrical productions. Not so easy in schools where kids are involved.
DeleteI'm in agreement. Our local school allows phones to be brought to school but they must be stored in a locker or turned off when in a classroom.
ReplyDeleteI think dropping off and retrieving phones at the ends of the school day would be a logistical nightmare. My vote would be to simply install cell phone signal blocker in classrooms rendering them useless until they are taken outside of the confines of school.
Is that possible Ed? If it is it is a great idea!
DeleteThey are sold on the black market here in the U.S. because it is against Federal law to interfere with cell phone signals.
DeletePeople are too involved with their phones these days. I see too many people walking and looking at their phones instead of watching where they are going or greeting the people they see.
ReplyDeleteOr just seeing what is around them in the world - the sky, the traffic, Nature, other humans passing by.
DeleteA local secondary school trialled phone free areas (they do not allow phones in the classroom) and the kids acknowledged that talking to mates during breaks is actually quite fun. The kids also agreed that not having phones in the classroom was less distracting. Phones are here to stay but we do need to realise that are not a limb without which we cannot live.
ReplyDeleteTheatergoers don't check them out during a performance.
DeleteThere are several schools in my city and in others across the country where phones are banned from classrooms. I think it's a great idea. They need to be paying attention to their lessons. There is even an advertisement on TV, showing kids in school writing and drawing etc (learning) and one with a phone in her hand, the wording (not exact) says "the future is in our children's hands that's why phones shouldn't be"
ReplyDeleteGreat that such an ad has been made. Shows awareness of the problem.
DeleteAgree entirely but a phone in the hand is addictive and habit forming, it will be difficult weaning the young off them.
ReplyDeleteAlmost as difficult as turning back the sea through willpower.
DeleteI have to wonder about the parents who call their kids at school. It's very disrespectful to the teacher and the child
ReplyDeleteThe mother who complained about me should instead have been apologising.
DeleteThe problem as I see it is that phones demand immediate attention. I realised a long time ago that email could have similar issues, and began to check it no more than 3 times a day. This annoyed one of the managers at work when I was absent from an "urgent" meeting because he had informed me of it by email that morning.
ReplyDeleteTeaching appropriate behaviour, silence the phone, put it away, don't call people in the middle of work (and school is work.) The mother needed a lesson, as well as the daughter.
ReplyDeleteI remember being very annoyed when members of my colleague's team would sit at their desks and quite openly use their mobile 'phones to text friends instead of working. When I raised this with our boss, she just shrugged and said ignore it. Our whole department was made redundant soon after as a senior member of management determined we were all inefficient.
ReplyDeleteNo, phones should definitely not be allowed into the schoolroom - they are far too distracting. I wonder if there are any children these days who don't have a phone?
ReplyDeleteFrom JayCee's comment, it seems they should be kept out of the workplace too.
I just did a quick check online and found that since last summer we have a law in Sweden that makes it possible for schools to practice what you suggest (pupils handing in their phones and getting them back at the end of the lesson, or school day) - but it seems routines still vary a lot between schools how it's handled, and how successfully. (Myself I've been away from school and work life since before smartphones were introduced.)
ReplyDeleteWe don't allow students to use their phones in class, but they can have them elsewhere in school. Many parents insist that they must have a way to reach their children. Terrorist incidents and school shootings have fed that climate of fear.
ReplyDelete