Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free • Hacker News Board

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#131

Post by lupire » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:36 PM UTC

willsmith72 wrote: post #76

zarzavat wrote: post #49

Confiscating phones from children for an entire week is an unhinged idea. Confiscating for the rest of the school day I can understand, but not giving them the phone back when they go home is dangerous. At some point a child will get abducted on their way home from school, or be unable to contact emergency services, because the school confiscated their phone. They seem to want parents to buy dumb phones instead for t…

> Can you imagine trying to text “I’m being followed by someone on XYZ road” on a Nokia-style keyboard? Do dumb phones support sending GPS coordinates to emergency services like smartphones do? what do you think the world looked like 15 years ago? the 1-week is a punitive punishment. you know you can't have this. you deliberately chose to use it. if you get it back at the end of the day, so what? you've lost nothing.…

Taking people's property is not acceptable. Parents can confiscate phones if they want. Schools can suspend disruptive pupils.

The UK has no sense of personal autonomy. Culturally no limits on controlling people to suit authority preference.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#132

Post by whimsicalism » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:36 PM UTC

jasonjei wrote: post #93

I think many of the comments in opposition to this are coming from people that do not have children. Many of those in support do. I speak as a parent of a child, and I think “parent brain” will affect your thoughts on this. Having said that, I grew up on dial up and very low tech HTML. Not social media which is an entirely different beast. There is a book called The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Child…

it sounds to me like you are describing overprotective parenting

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#133

Post by ImJamal » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:38 PM UTC

micromacrofoot wrote: post #69

prmoustache wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What kind of parent will call or message their kids during school hours? All the ressources mentionned can probably be accessed through other means, usually the school library which has computer terminals.

it's incredibly common, like a quick text from the child "hey don't pick me up today I'm going to Greg's house" or a parent saying "do you have football practice today"

How did people ever survive school 20 years without such an ability?

There is an easy solution that could be implemented. Kids can go to the office during lunch or a break and request their phone. They can send their message and then give back their phone.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#134

Post by whimsicalism » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:38 PM UTC

willsmith72 wrote: post #114

vidarh wrote: post #94

My son (15 in London) has moved schools more than I'd like and they've all had smartphone policies that ranged from "must be in your bag", via "must be in your locker", to "must be left at home". None have allowed phones to be out during school hours, or on school grounds, other than in very limited circumstances, generally with prior permission, so I'm more surprised that so many schools, apparently all in Southwark…

> parents wanted to be able to check in if e.g. they were running late) this one is just so funny to me. dumbphone argument aside, what do these parents think happened when they, themselves, were running late from school? somehow, their parents managed without a direct, 24/7 line.

teenagers back then were more likely to have a car in the US, so they could get themselves home.

not so today in suburbia

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#135

Post by Planktonne » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:39 PM UTC

candiddevmike wrote: post #2

What was the impetus for schools to become "smartphone-friendly"? In the 00s, phones/smartphones in class weren't a thing.

Tech evangelists/EdTech salespeople saying that it was the future; there's been a big push in recent years.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#136

Post by Biganon » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:39 PM UTC

cynicalsecurity wrote: post #41

This is plainly idiotic. Smartphones are great for having useful apps for studying such as dictionaries and translators, they provide access to Wikipedia and means to communicate with other kids. They also make parents feel less stressful knowing they can always call or message their kids. Whoever came up with this idea is a retrograde.

No kid in the history of the world has ever used their phone in class to willingly use Wikipedia or a translator, stop this nonsense.

If the school wants to teach children how to use these tools, fine, but on devices that won't spy on them or allow them to destroy their brain on tiktok. They can do this at home.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#137

Post by vidarh » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:41 PM UTC

willsmith72 wrote: post #114

vidarh wrote: post #94

My son (15 in London) has moved schools more than I'd like and they've all had smartphone policies that ranged from "must be in your bag", via "must be in your locker", to "must be left at home". None have allowed phones to be out during school hours, or on school grounds, other than in very limited circumstances, generally with prior permission, so I'm more surprised that so many schools, apparently all in Southwark…

> parents wanted to be able to check in if e.g. they were running late) this one is just so funny to me. dumbphone argument aside, what do these parents think happened when they, themselves, were running late from school? somehow, their parents managed without a direct, 24/7 line.

I agree to an extent, and found it idiotic how strict they were about kids being accompanied to/from his primary school for that matter. But that secondary school was in an area where even I was skeptical about having him have no way of getting hold of us, not so much for safety, as because it'd take fairly little disruption for it to get complicated for him to make his way home in a reasonable time due to odd bus routes. And some kids have health issues - e.g. my son has struggled with various issues with his knees - where you don't want them facing a 1.5h-2h walk home if busses are messed up etc.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#138

Post by Retric » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:42 PM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #100

Retric wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Auto corrupt of study hall, also known as a free period. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Study_hall

That would be very unusual until the final two years of school in England.

As a predefined period sure, but I assume kids in crutches still skip PE and whatnot, though you might be calling it something else.

Whatever you call a disruption in normal education such as when a teacher gets in a car accident on the way to work and suddenly there’s a non educational period for kids.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#139

Post by dudu24 » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:42 PM UTC

jasonjei wrote: post #93

I think many of the comments in opposition to this are coming from people that do not have children. Many of those in support do. I speak as a parent of a child, and I think “parent brain” will affect your thoughts on this. Having said that, I grew up on dial up and very low tech HTML. Not social media which is an entirely different beast. There is a book called The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Child…

Haidt is a reactionary who makes grandiose conjectures about the Kids These Days with little real scientific evidence to back them up. He's the same guy who threw a fit over safe spaces in colleges and made them out to be a way bigger deal than the were/are.

Re: Group of 17 London secondary schools join up to go smartphone-free

#140

Post by michaelt » Mon, Jun 17, 2024, 4:42 PM UTC

willsmith72 wrote: post #44

leohonexus wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That an official government document explicitly mentioning that school staff is allowed to search a device without law enforcement (either being present, or authorized by warrant) is problematic in and of itself.

but why? if im a teacher getting wind of cyberbullying, or a photo being shared, what should i do? call the police every time? im telling you, the police will not like that policy any more than the students. you're in a school. you don't have the right to do whatever you please.

I agree that teachers should be able to enforce discipline in schools.

With that said, I've got no idea what schools should do about things like sexting.

If I was a teacher and I confiscated a phone which might have illegal photos of underage students on it, I wouldn't want to turn a blind eye to that. But I also sure as hell wouldn't want to search it myself. I'd want that done by someone of unimpeachable character.