Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

Post by martin_bech » Wed, Apr 30, 2025, 1:57 PM UTC

nabla9 wrote: post #150

It had to be a law because children are people in Finland and most Nordic countries with rights that adults just can't take away. Current legislation allows the teacher to tell a student to put their phone away in a pocket or backpack, for example, where it will not be a distraction. The use of phones during breaks cannot be completely banned, as students have fundamental rights. The Constitution guarantees everyone…

Post by jofzar » Wed, Apr 30, 2025, 2:02 PM UTC

_bin_ wrote: post #301

anhner wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those rights can't be taken away... without existing legislation. There are many rights that can be taken away, freedom of movement for example in the case of prisoners, but you need laws in order to not make that taking away a crime itself. You can't just apprehend and throw someone in your basement because they stole something from you. Same thing with children's phones, a teacher can't just take away the phone bec…

Sure, I think this just looks a little alien from an American perspective because most of our rights are set up as explicit negatives to block the government from legislating them away, more than to prevent Joe or Jane Teacher from taking a phone. "Congress shall pass no law..." I guess the nordics don't have a common-law tradition and so never inhereted the in loco parentis doctrine that allows schools to take subst…

Post by hackyhacky » Wed, Apr 30, 2025, 2:05 PM UTC

_bin_ wrote: post #301

anhner wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those rights can't be taken away... without existing legislation. There are many rights that can be taken away, freedom of movement for example in the case of prisoners, but you need laws in order to not make that taking away a crime itself. You can't just apprehend and throw someone in your basement because they stole something from you. Same thing with children's phones, a teacher can't just take away the phone bec…

Sure, I think this just looks a little alien from an American perspective because most of our rights are set up as explicit negatives to block the government from legislating them away, more than to prevent Joe or Jane Teacher from taking a phone. "Congress shall pass no law..." I guess the nordics don't have a common-law tradition and so never inhereted the in loco parentis doctrine that allows schools to take subst…

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 30, 2025, 2:07 PM UTC

DocTomoe wrote: post #258

kube-system wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I did not take me twelve years to learn to read and write. It takes people twelve years to learn to read and write at a 12th grade level. You could study it for another 4 or more years at university if you wanted to develop your skills further. > What made me good at reading was reading books outside of school. This is your personal experience. I learned to read and write quite well at school and was well-prepared…

> It takes people twelve years to learn to read and write at a 12th grade level. Nah. You are mixing up the skill 'writing glyphs on a piece of paper and retrieving that information via optical means' with 'being well-grounded in a wide array of subjects so you can express an idea in a way that is mentally stimulating to a potential reader'. Neither takes 12 years to learn. The first, we teach within a year, at most.…

Post by jofzar » Wed, Apr 30, 2025, 2:09 PM UTC

shayway wrote: post #214

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #138

I deplore the fact that schools need to resort to banning phones. When I was younger I imagined a world in which computing devices would be a boon to (young) people everywhere. But many apps appear to be detrimental to people's mental health, both young and old. Possibly this can be changed. Maybe separate app stores are a solution (think f-droid)? Or maybe we need to start looking a lot harder at apps that might act…

Smartphones were just starting to be common right around the time I hit middle and high school. Teachers let us use them whenever we wanted, more or less, but if there was something we were supposed to be doing, we were only allowed to use them for educational purposes. We were often encouraged to use them, in fact. If there was ever a question someone asked that the teachers couldn't answer, or they heard an argumen…