Angela Fleck says this was the typical scene last year in the sixth-grade social studies classes she teaches at Glover Middle School in Spokane, Washington: Almost every student had a smartphone, and many of them regularly glanced to the devices, which they kept. hidden behind a book or right under their desks.
“They're pretty sneaky, so you wouldn't always know what the reason was,” Fleck says. “But over time, I realized that no matter how interesting my lesson was, when it came time to pivot and do the group activity or homework (something that wasn't entirely me leading the class), there was a large number of people. students who had no idea what we were doing.”
What students did with their phones, she says, was most often using Snapchat or other social media or texting with students in other classrooms, which she described as creating drama: “And then it just spread quickly, whoever was the situation.” , and sometimes it resulted in altercations: they would meet at a certain place and settle it all day on the phone.”
This year, however, the atmosphere has changed. Spokane Public Schools issued a new district-wide policy prohibiting the use of smartphones or smart watches in classrooms during instructional time. That's why elementary and middle school students now have to keep their devices turned off and put away during the school day, although high school students can use their smartphones or watches between classes and during lunch.
Now, he says, he feels like he has the attention of most students during classes, since he no longer has to compete with buzzing devices. “Generally, students are ready to learn,” he says. “As a teacher, I need to make sure I have an interesting lesson that keeps their attention and helps them learn and still want to participate.” And he says there are also fewer fights at school.
The district is one of many across the country who have instituted new smartphone bans this year, in the name of increasing student participation and countering the negative effects that social media has on young people's mental health. And at least four states (Indiana, Louisiana, South Carolina and Florida) have enacted statewide bans limiting smartphone access in schools.
For this week's EdSurge podcast, we set out to get a sense of how bans are going. To do so, we spoke with Fleck, as well as a high school teacher in Indiana, where a new state law bans smartphones and other wireless devices in schools during instructional time.
Fleck is a supporter of the ban and says she hopes the school never returns to the old approach. But he admits he misses some aspects of having phones available to integrate into a lesson when needed.
In the past, for example, he allowed students to take pictures with their phones of the slides he showed. And he often designated a student as a researcher during lessons, who could search for related material online and share it with the group. Now he's finding ways to adapt to maintain those positive aspects of online access, he says, such as having student researchers use a computer in the classroom or making more use of school-provided laptops for some lessons.
Adam Swinyard, superintendent of Spokane Public Schools, acknowledges that the new ban has its pros and cons when it comes to the use of technology in instruction.
“We have absolutely lost some of the power of the opportunity that those devices provide, whether it's 'I can look up something very quickly,' or 'I can quickly participate in a class survey,' or 'I can tune my musical instrument.'” he told EdSurge. “But I think where we land in our community, for our schools, and for our children, is that what we gain in their level of engagement and ability to focus far outweighs what we are losing in a device that is a powerful pedagogical tool within the system. classroom. But I think it's important to recognize it.”
What they end up teaching students, he maintains, is more important. The district's mantra is that there is a “time and place” for smartphone use, Swinyard says, and that a classroom is not the right place or occasion, just as he wouldn't pull out his phone and type a text message while being interviewed for this article or sitting in an important meeting.
Some schools with new bans have faced pushback from students, especially where there has been zero tolerance for phones even during social time. At a Jasper high school in Plano, Texas, for example, more than 250 people signed a petition asking the principal to review a new smartphone ban, which prohibits the use of devices throughout the day, including during lunch and in the hallways between classes. “Before restricted use of cell phones was banned, they were a social link that connected students during lunch and hallway breaks,” the petition reads.
and some parents have complained about the new bans, for fear of not being able to reach their children in the event of an emergency, such as a school shooting. TO twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer-pew” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener nofollow”>new survey The Pew Research Center found that about 7 in 10 Americans support banning cellphone use during class, while only about a third favor an all-day ban.
So one conclusion is that how schools design their smartphone restrictions (and how they communicate the policies to students and parents) is important to how they work in practice.
Hear more about the pros and cons of the new smartphone bans on this week's EdSurge podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcastsor in the player below.
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