I would welcome a ban on smartphones in my child’s secondary school.
At present, in my child’s school they are allowed to take them in, but the rule is that they are to be kept at in their bags and not be seen at all. I think they get a couple of behaviour points if seen, and if seen for a third time then it is confiscated.
I know that, had smartphones existed when I was in school, I would have been a master a checking it without getting caught. I would have been on social media, messaging my friends, secretly listening to music with one AirPod under my hair, looking up answers to questions I didn’t know. I’d have never got in trouble because I would have been stealth like in my use of it. But it would have distracted me, it would have called out to me all day. I’d be waiting for my next check of it and thinking about it. I would therefore not have worked as hard, or chatted to friends as much. It would have fed me a horrible narrative about what I should look like, what my life should be like, how everyone appeared better than me and I’d be full of anxiety and not feel good enough.
This is what is happening to our children today. They don’t have the strength to stay away from them - they may not be seen doing it but they are constantly on them. Even the best behaved kids.
Even if teachers do notice a child having a quick look at their phone, they’ve got so much other stuff to do with the demands of their job - are they going to challenge the child and make more work for themselves or are they going to pretend they haven’t seen it.
Children take secret photos and videos and send them to one another to ridicule and bully. Inappropriate contest is airdropped and shared via WhatsApp groups.
As a parent, I am on it with internet safety (as is dh). We use parental control tools and my year 7 child is not allowed social media,free access to the internet and we monitor their use of their phone each evening. There are screen time limits and phone switches of at 7pm and is not allowed in bedroom.
I often feel like we are going against the grain in doing this. I feel alone and like other parents don’t see the issue with handing our children a device where they can access ANYTHING and absolutely will access anything because they are naturally curious. Curiosity is normal, but the level of information, the horrors, the ideologies and the algorithms that form as a result are not. They are extremely damaging.
I know, when I look online (I know, the irony) that there are other parents that feel the same way. But it is hard in real life. When you’re child goes to secondary school and makes new friends who went to a different primary you have no idea what their parents, and their parenting choices, are like.
Whilst I know my child is safe online in my home, I don’t know when I send them out to school. They can be exposed to all sorts of horrors / porn / ideologies because other parents send their child to school with unrestricted smartphones, whether that is because they don’t understand the dangers, or simply do not care.
do any other parents agree with me that schools should be made to ban smartphones entirely? And by ban I mean asking students to hand them in - either a locker or a faraday pouch on arrival. I get that they are a part of life and needed for safety on journey to and from school (although I would argue that for many they don’t actually even need it for that!). But during school hours they simply do not need them and should not have access to them.
This has been rolled out in some schools already and the benefits are already being seen. I would welcome it in a heartbeat if my child’s school did this!!
What do you think? Would really love to hear people’s opinions -
YABU - children should be allowed access to their phones throughout the school day
YANBU - all schools should ban smartphone access on school sites entirely by asking students to leave them at home, place them in a phone locker or in a faraday pouch