Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

yle.fi

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 491 posts

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#241

Post by bluGill »

myrmidon wrote: post #156
andrepd wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm very confident that early discrimination/segregation ("gifted" and "idiot" tracks in school) is a net negative for society and encourages unethical outcomes on top. I'm curious about this, can you elaborate more? My feeling is that in a class of 25 kids grouped by age being taught by 1 single teacher, it's basically impossible that the teaching pace and style is adequate for more than a handful of them. You're…

My view is that schools purpose is teaching everyone not only a common baseline in language/math, but also how to deal with expectations/responsibilities and other people (teachers and classmates). By doing "early segregation" you make this more difficult because that "common baseline" no longer exists; you'd expect to get significantly more people that struggle with language and basic math as a result (in exchange f…

Don't forget that kid that was 1 point off from making the gifted track that now gets stuck with much worse options for the rest of their life even though they could probably pass the gifted track as well (at the bottom of the class, but still a pass).

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#242

Post by meowface »

MrsPeaches wrote: post #115
cudder wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least used to. Last few years Finland's PISA scores as measured by the OECD have plummeted and now they are just a bit above average but nowhere near what they used to be.

Also interesting to note the gender divide in scores in Finland: https://www.statista.com/statistics/986939/student-performan...

Wow, that's a huge reading gap.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#243

Post by constantcrying »

kube-system wrote: post #192
constantcrying wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time?

> Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time? Was that not offered at your school? It was at mine. University level courses do presume you have some basic skills. But in many places, schools do offer university level courses for those who are prepared.

>Was that not offered at your school?

I think it would have been theoretically possible, but obviously logistically difficult as I would have had to skip multiple classes in other fields to attend.

It's also not like I was particularly interested in mathematics at that point in my life. I essentially chose my field of study based on what I had the best grades in. Only during my studies, when the material actually became difficult, I started to be interested and engaged in the subject.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#244

Post by zx90 »

_Algernon_ wrote: post #103
FinnLobsien wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're right in a way because if school wants to prepare kids for work, then they'll have to get competent with tech. But at the same time, I think banning smartphones is perfectly fine because you can still use computers and stuff. It's not like they're going back to quills and ink. Smartphones fry your attention span and enable bullying. And if parents want to have emergency contact, you can always have a s…

>I think you're right in a way because if school wants to prepare kids for work, then they'll have to get competent with tech. They are failing spectacularly on that front anyways. You don't learn useful skills by being handed a remotely administered tablet or Chromebook, which is what schools provide.

I saw this in the Netherlands: Chromebooks with which the children did their research online, submitted their homework online, got them graded online, organized their workgroups, schedules and meetings online ...

Actually they were learnig vital skills like Agile Sprint management! (I don't know if they ever physically met for standup meeetings)

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#246

Post by constantcrying »

bmn__ wrote: post #199
constantcrying wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haha, are you serious?

He is. Today is the day you realise that thanks to your innate intelligence you had a time of privilege in school.

I felt much more privileged when I was at university and there were students far more intelligent than me, who helped me with the material.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#248

Post by kube-system »

constantcrying wrote: post #243
kube-system wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time? Was that not offered at your school? It was at mine. University level courses do presume you have some basic skills. But in many places, schools do offer university level courses for those who are prepared.

>Was that not offered at your school? I think it would have been theoretically possible, but obviously logistically difficult as I would have had to skip multiple classes in other fields to attend. It's also not like I was particularly interested in mathematics at that point in my life. I essentially chose my field of study based on what I had the best grades in. Only during my studies, when the material actually bec…

For the schools that offer students the ability to take university-level courses, students aren't "skipping" other classes.

> Only during my studies, when the material actually became difficult, I started to be interested and engaged in the subject.

Many schools solve this by having different difficulty-levels of courses. My school, in the US, had three.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#249

Post by ty6853 »

Ekaros wrote: post #185
makeitdouble wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prohibition didn't work for booze, doesn't work for drugs. Why would you be expecting better results for this ?

Smoking ban in bars and restaurants seem to work. So doing same with phones in schools during lesson time does not seem unreasonable.

I agree it is not unreasonable, but I'd also note that bars have their livelihood at stake. While a child has their phone at stake, you cannot threaten their livelihood without a trip to prison.

There are no material stakes to the child other than losing their entertainment device. Might as well break the rules.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#250

Post by rapind »

meowface wrote: post #234
dweekly wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those are good reasons to have a smart watch with cellular capabilities. They are not good reasons to have a phone at school. In terms of QOL: there is a meaningful body of research about the impact of giving a teenage girl access to a phone on their quality of life. https://adc.bmj.com/content/109/7/576 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S245195882...

I assume those effects are similar even if they're only using the phone before and after school.

Probably, but it would be much less reasonable for the state to enforce outside of school (both for practical and ideological reasons).
Post reply on HN