06-16-2019, 12:09 AM
Ombligo wrote:
Phone use has gotten completely out of control in schools. I wish we had the resolve that France has - it banned all phones from its schools as a criminal offense. Until we do something similar, we are just fooling ourselves.
As an instructor, this is something I have to deal with on a fairly daily basis. The views range from completely banning the phones, to actually actively getting the students to use them in class.
I fall somewhere in the middle, but closer to the former than the latter ... in my experience, the temptation is really just too great for students to be doing things on their devices other than paying attention and learning. Also there is a lot of good data out there to prove that getting the students' attention away from their devices really does improve performance (duh!).
Also, I've observed firsthand that phone addiction is a very real thing -- if I were somehow able to get them to part with their phones for an hour, they would become VERY anxious and not know what to do with themselves.
As with most edu issues, the problems start at home. Apparently the average age for a child in the U.S. to receive their first phone is now 10. If parents complain that students can't have phones, and the children themselves complain, and the schools just give in, not surprisingly, that sets a precedent that lasts long through college and probably also the workplace.