this post was submitted on 13 Jun 2023
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American high school teacher here (Midwest region). We implemented a policy this year banning cellphones in instructional spaces during instructional time. Enforceable by confiscation if teachers saw or heard a phone. We have a strong set of administrators who supported teachers in any case where there was student pushback. It has been a huge success in terms of limiting distractions during instructional time. All of our students are provided Chromebooks so there really isnβt much of an instructional reason to have phones anyway. It has also contributed to a drop in student-on-student behavior problems.
I do feel for the girl in this article for whom it was used as a coping mechanism for bullying. No policy comes with zero downsides. However, it sounds like she was allowed exceptions in certain cases, which is exactly what should happen.
Right, it's kind of a trolley problem. Is it better to do lesser harm through action (banning cell phones, meaning a few students like this can't reach their family during school hours), or greater harm through inaction (loose cell phone policy, harming the learning process for everyone, inviting violence against teachers who are competing against addictive algorithms for their students' attention)?
Cell phones barely existed when I was in school and were certainly out of reach for students. Bullying still happened (personal experience, yay) and staff would shut that shit down when they saw it or it was reported.
I also went to school with no cell phones, and was bullied mercilessly. Staff didn't care then, and I doubt they care now. I'm glad you went to a school where the adults cared.
When was this? I was in high school during the early 00's. There were no cell phones, not because of policy, but because they just weren't commonplace.
It's not lesser harm since no one else is gonna pay for the mental health bills nor could revert the damage done from the bullying. And when someone snaps from bullying you are gonna see blood for sure. (and little kids/teens snaps from very little things, talking from experiences.) have you ever seen clip where a chubby kid slams a bully teasing him upside down? the bully got slammed could be paralyzed for life, or worse dead, the chubby kid that got bullied could bear that trauma for life, it happens when bully think no one is watching and it's "life as usual", picking on this bigger kid to have some power fantasy or bragging to his mates. If the chubby kid had the tool, pull out a phone and push a button and say, "I'm live streaming this and will report to teacher and my parents, watch your action and leave me alone." Wouldn't the violence resolved without potential life changing events?
I meant harm in that it affects "one or a few students" rather than affecting "practically all students."
school is place to learn 2 things:
And IMO, the first point is way more important than the second. Let's see the implication by breaking down the proposed ban.
From the anti-bullying side:
From the learning, focus during instructional time:
For engagement, from my old self and what my friends here from different background/countries/age bracket discuss their past, the one common thing is fun knowledgeable teacher and how enjoyable their class was last life time long. It shapes their understanding, how they engage other people or topics involving different areas. kids and teens are like herds of fun chasing animal, if even half of your class is having fun and discuss the materials and exchanging questions etc, the rest will follow cause they don't want to be "left out".
In short, if a teen can learn how to calculate DPS and build sets for their favorite game but fails the math about probability and expected value, the teacher is doing something wrong.
Again, your old self, and mine for that matter, didn't have the constant, always-on global communications device in your pocket with precision-engineered addiction algorithms frying your dopamine receptors. Yes, I'm going to boomer out here and say that ShitTok and their ilk are a scourge on youth and on society as a whole. The predictive promotional algorithm, flashy multimedia content, and, let's be honest, what amounts of soft porn in many cases, absolutely lays waste to attention spans and studious pursuits β doubly so in young, fertile minds. No teacher, no matter how good they are, can compete with that.
I can't link to it right now for obvious reasons, but there was a post a little while ago on /r/teachers from an experienced educator lamenting on how the behaviour of students has degraded dramatically in just the last few years. They not only lack respect for their teachers, they're actively disrespectful and sometimes flat-out violent towards educators and staff (particularly when their dopamine pumps are confiscated), and willfully destructive. Students lash out, destroy expensive equipment for fun, and are just downright ineducable.
I may be mixing my sources right now, I believe this was from a corresponding YouTube video that was linked in the post or comments, but the concluding notion I was left with is that there's an epidemic of emotional dysregulation among youth, induced by combination of poor parenting, lack of effective authority, and β the big one β smartphone addiction. The sentiment that lingers in my head: kids today are no longer interested in learning, they're only interested in how they can be entertained in the next five minutes.
I think there could be an agreeable balance where students are expected to leave their devices out of sight and on mute during instructional and recess periods. This could be a teaching tool for them to learn about the common courtesy of not being disruptive in settings where attentiveness and other activities are expected and appropriate. Or, really, they could just leave their phones in their lockers. We survived just fine without them at all.