I don't think smartphones should be allowed in schools but as someone who was dumbfounded by the lunchtime cacophony of my peers, I wouldn't lead with that as a triumph.
Tech will prevail on the long term, even with these misguided bans.
NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
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Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#32So I have eye witness accounts of this lunchroom saying that's not true. The lunchroom was deafeningly loud before the ban.
This school is also a magnet school with only high-performing kids who did not suffer from distraction problems and who actively made use of phones during class for classwork.
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#33This is really funny for me to read because as a kid we were prohibited from having telecommunications devices while at school entirely. We were also prohibited from speaking during lunchtime. Our lunch was most definitely not loud.
When I was in elementary school one of the teachers would hold a decibel meter and subtract minutes off of recess if we got above a whispered conversation.
In class that is good. However at lunch kids should be talking to other kids. I know many teachers/schools are control freaks and so they would do such things, but it was always evil.
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#34It makes me so sad that it's possible for technology to steal the need to talk and play, even from our youth. If you have little kids you know how frantically they NEED to yap and play. I hold such horror for anything that would sap such life away.
It varies a lot. My kids will run around and play given the opportunity, but when they arrive home at 6pm from after-school club, completely exhausted, I think it's fair that they get to collapse in front of a screen for a bit.
Even then, individual screens is isolating.
Collapsing in front of the TV with the family was still quality time enjoying something together.
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#35Hopefully society continues to develop healthy norms with regard to this sort of technology. Collectively it's taken us a while, but I think people generally are starting to get the picture. Smartphones are bad in a wide variety of ways, but even when people miss some of the nuance I think we can make progress regarding the minimization of their usage.
Some people will slap a label like "liberal" on "using my smartphone whenever the hell I want". And then people will think that's how it should be.
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
It varies a lot. My kids will run around and play given the opportunity, but when they arrive home at 6pm from after-school club, completely exhausted, I think it's fair that they get to collapse in front of a screen for a bit.
For my generation (just post-Boomer), it was the TV. For my parents, it was the radio. For their parents, reading out loud for everyone to enjoy ("Mr. Dickens has published another episode of The Pickwick Papers !"), or playing instruments.
Music is medicine. I’ve been taking guitar for a few years now and it’s pure joy.
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#37Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#38Hopefully society continues to develop healthy norms with regard to this sort of technology. Collectively it's taken us a while, but I think people generally are starting to get the picture. Smartphones are bad in a wide variety of ways, but even when people miss some of the nuance I think we can make progress regarding the minimization of their usage.
Hopefully as a society we can also learn the lesson that tech companies cannot be trusted to deliver what's best for us.
Why would anyone expect them to deliver what is best for us when the purpose of a company is to deliver what others want?
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
It varies a lot. My kids will run around and play given the opportunity, but when they arrive home at 6pm from after-school club, completely exhausted, I think it's fair that they get to collapse in front of a screen for a bit.
Even then, individual screens is isolating. Collapsing in front of the TV with the family was still quality time enjoying something together.
For a lot of young people the screen is social - the equivalent of the long after-school phonecalls from the before times. Be it games or just Discord, it's still comms.
Re: NY school phone ban has made lunch loud again
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
It varies a lot. My kids will run around and play given the opportunity, but when they arrive home at 6pm from after-school club, completely exhausted, I think it's fair that they get to collapse in front of a screen for a bit.
Even then, individual screens is isolating. Collapsing in front of the TV with the family was still quality time enjoying something together.
Individual screens let parents get some peace and quiet for a while. As with everything, moderation is the key, not abstention.