To me, these two points of view were not exactly on the same topic. Josh Allen seemed to be writing about why schools should not provide cell phones for student use, and Liz Kolb wrote about how the cell phones students already own can be used for educational purposes. In my mind, these are not exactly the same topic. That said, I found things to agree with in both of these writings. I agree with Josh Allen that schools have better things to spend money on than providing cell phones to their students. However, I also do not know of any schools that are even considering this option. I agree with Liz Kolb that there is a possibility that cell phones could be used for educational purposes but to me, it seems that this would have to be the student's choice, not something I assigned to them. For example, while I might assign them to create a podcast, whether or not they used their cell phones to do so would be their choice. I do not think it would be smart to assign a task that could only be completed using a cell phone. Even today, some students do not have cell phones, whether for financial or other reasons. I don't think teachers have the right to require them, or to necessitate their use.
In my own classroom, I would absolutely allow students to use cell phones for certain assignments if they chose to do so. It will not be a requirement and other options will be offered for assignment completion. However, I would not allow students to use their phones except during designated times. The availability of phones means that students can text during class, and also makes cheating much easier. I plan to have a strict "one warning, and then I take your phone" rule during everyday lessons. Just as texting is not appropriate in a business meeting, nor is it appropriate in my class.
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I agree with you about the issues bringing a cell phone into a class presents. I realized that this would make texting MUCH easier to do (as opposed to if you didn't allow cell phones all together). But what I didn't think of that is an excellent point, is that this would also make cheating much easier. Having phones accessible like this makes it much more convenient for a student to just pull out their phone and either text their friend an answer or pass it to them. Some phones can be turned to auto-read the text, so they wouldn't even have to push any buttons... seems problematic.
ReplyDeleteMost schools have polices regarding students use of cellphones, but we all know that for some students that just gives them incentive to cross the line. This past school year I was the state testing administrator for my high school and I had to invalidate some tests because students were using their phones during the test. I provided explicit instructions and still they tried to text during the test. Cell phones are very problematic and I don't believe that there will ever be a place for them in secondary education.
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