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Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

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Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#371

Post by CivBase »

sureIy wrote: post #362
CivBase wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By that argument, it sounds like schools in Finland have zero authority. How does punishment work? What's stopping a kid from going anywhere they want at any time or doing litterally anything that isn't outright illegal? If Finnish children have the same rights as adults, does that mean the children are also subject to the same legal punishment as adults? Can a Finnish child be jailed or fined for the likes of theft,…

I don't know, but I would hope that it works because parents are expected to teach their children to behave. Also just because they can't take their phone or punish them, it doesn't mean that they can't suspend students or fail them.

> I don't know, but I would hope that it works because parents are expected to teach their children to behave.

Unfortunately that hasn't proven to be a reliable method here in the United States :(

> Also just because they can't take their phone or punish them, it doesn't mean that they can't suspend students or fail them.

I'm not a teacher but my wife is so I can only speak to what I've heard from her. And by her accounts, out-of-school suspention is ineffective because you're essentially rewarding misbehaving children with not having to come to school. She also isn't allowed to lower a student's grade for behavioral issues. Their grade is supposed to be purely a reflection of how well the know the material defined by the curriculum.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#372

Post by nkrisc »

RHSeeger wrote: post #172
PeterStuer wrote: post #3

If the goal of school is to develop children into young adults with good reasoning and analytical skills, a basic wholesome world and social model and some practical skills and basic physique, smartphones seem to contribute little and distract a lot from those aims.

My daughter brings her phone to school with her - If he bus doesn't show up, she can call and ask us to come drive her to school - If she wants to go somewhere after school, she can call us and let us know she won't be home at her normal time - If she forgot something at home, she can call and ask us to bring it - etc, etc, etc There's a ton of reasons for her to have her phone on her. Enough so that, when she gets p…

These are all normal childhood things that were managed long before smartphones existed. Yes, a mobile phone makes these things more convenient, but it is far from necessary.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#373

Post by PeterStuer »

ysavir wrote: post #338
PeterStuer wrote: post #3

If the goal of school is to develop children into young adults with good reasoning and analytical skills, a basic wholesome world and social model and some practical skills and basic physique, smartphones seem to contribute little and distract a lot from those aims.

I agree with your take on the purpose of schools and that smartphones contribute little. But my concern is that actions like these teach students an additional lesson: That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes. Children and teens absorb a lot, and while they don't always absorb the contents of their lectures, they do typically absorb how they're treated and how th…

We put a lot of restrictions on minors and what they can do or be done to. On top of that, some things which would be ok in a different setting would be inapropriate and disruptive in a classroom environment.

Also, with regards to the motivational aspect, I would not expect a toddler to be able to make the appropriate choice between a healty meal and candy. I do not expect a teen to be able to restrain themselves from the pubescent games of social media prancing and paying attention to the class teaching.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#374

Post by mixmastamyk »

udev4096 wrote: post #297
torpfactory wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the skill though? Most everything you do on a smartphone is trivially easy thanks to all those hard working app developers. We all know from experience that the vast majority of actual phone time is spent consuming some kind of media. I’m not at all worried about kids not learning to use a smartphone well enough- that part will sort itself out. It’s all the other (boring) skills that get pushed aside in the mi…

There are quite a lot of things you can mess around with. Install a custom ROM, a custom recovery or build a custom ROM from scratch. Use emulated players such as winlator for gaming. Use GrapheneOS for maximum privacy and security. Use termux for learning CLI. There are tons and tons of things you could do with that little rectangle screen

The time our kid spent doing that, even when shown the possibilities: zero.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#375

Post by mixmastamyk »

criddell wrote: post #261
torpfactory wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the skill though? Most everything you do on a smartphone is trivially easy thanks to all those hard working app developers. We all know from experience that the vast majority of actual phone time is spent consuming some kind of media. I’m not at all worried about kids not learning to use a smartphone well enough- that part will sort itself out. It’s all the other (boring) skills that get pushed aside in the mi…

Where my kids went to high school, a smart phone was required. The teacher would encourage kids to put assignments and tests on their calendar. They would use the camera to take a picture of a home work assignment written on a whiteboard. They used the camera for photo and movie projects. They had some twitter-like app for the teacher to broadcast to all students.

Here too, kids are enslaved to google, microsoft, AND apple as well.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#376

Post by barbazoo »

bluGill wrote: post #195
probably_wrong wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All of those problems can be solved without smartphones, as evidenced by literally every previous generation dealing with them. If anything, my grumpy self would argue that not having means to contact my parents if I forgot something ensured that I paid more attention the night before to what I had to pack. But I'm open to compromise: let's give children bring dumb phones that can only call and text.

Sure. I remember standing in line at the phone for 10 minutes as a kid waiting for my turn to call my parents when my activity was done. Cell phones are better. Smart phones would mean I could use the time waiting for something. Smart phones when class is in session is a distraction and should be banned. However outside of class they are helpful.

Of course we need our kids to use their time more efficiently, can’t have any idle time, no no /s

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#377

Post by seanw444 »

nabla9 wrote: post #294
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US constitution doesn't give any rights. It restricts the power of the government to curtail rights that already exist.

I hope you understand that's just cute wording. Individual rights exist only as far as they are protected by others. If you are robbed and nobody goes after the robber, the right to property does not de facto exist. The government must take an action.

The government doesn't need to take action when I already shot him dead, because they didn't infringe on my already-existing right to keep and bear arms.

The "cute wording" is important because the mindset matters. If enough of the population believes that rights are permitted to a person, they will attempt to revoke the permission. If they believe that rights are fundamental and inalienable, they wouldn't dare to think of trampling it in the first place. Of course, through the years, that perspective has shifted a lot away from the latter and to the former, to which I say "the tree of liberty must be watered from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#378

Post by bluGill »

DiggyJohnson wrote: post #348
bluGill wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No they cannot. My school had multiple doors that could not see each other - more than once my parents were waiting for me at a different door from the one I was standing at waiting for them. We did find each other, but only after a lot of searching - sometimes we even passed each other as we both switched doors to wait at. Okay, it did work out, but not nearly as well as a simple cell phone. Smart phones add additio…

You are describing a minor inconvenience right?

The world is still better with smart phones and not having that inconvenience.

Now there are other downsides of smartphones. We do need to mitigate them. However lets not throw out the good just because of the bad.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#379

Post by bluGill »

zelphirkalt wrote: post #329
bluGill wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. I remember standing in line at the phone for 10 minutes as a kid waiting for my turn to call my parents when my activity was done. Cell phones are better. Smart phones would mean I could use the time waiting for something. Smart phones when class is in session is a distraction and should be banned. However outside of class they are helpful.

10 minutes, that you could use socializing with other students/pupils. Well, I can see the problem, we cannot possibly inflict this upon our children.

We didn't though. A few did, but most of us were standing in line while our friends where elsewhere.

Re: Finland Bans Smartphones in Schools

#380

Post by makeitdouble »

lolinder wrote: post #159
makeitdouble wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kids still get to walk with cars around, ride bikes, drive motorcycles usually a few years before majority, they also ride cars and are usually familiar with how they work way before driving. I'm actually of the option we should have a smartphone category/setup at the same positioning as bikes are to cars, it would even benefit adults the same way not everyone wants a car.

We do, they're called regular cellphones. They can be used to make phone calls and even to send text messages, but they can't be used to access social media hellscapes.

Phone calls are for emergencies at this point. If it's not it's spam. Then Apple ruined SMS ( except for the US apparently?), nobody wants to gamble whether a message will reach a phone or the iPad sitting in a drawer still associated with the phone number.

So social things, like communicating with people, happens on social apps.

Kids also would be better with map apps, GPS, electronic payments and auto-charging bus/train pass if you expect them to have any independence.

All in all, kids should be the last ones IMHO to get real dumb phones. We might as well give them pagers if that's what we're going for.

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