Mobile phones in secondary school

[PeppermintPasty]

My ds is still only seven, so this issue is a while off for me personally, but I've been meaning to post for ages. I have pondered this out loud with friends who have older children and they just shrug or say something feeble like 'all their friends have them'. I am preparing myself to be the only parent who will not allow her children to have phones in school. Is that BU?

I am genuinely puzzled/amazed even, that schools seem to allow all secondary school children to have mobiles in school. I mean at all.

At the risk of sounding like an old duffer, what's wrong with going to the office and using the school phone if you need to?

I think I am being really thick, and missing some major crucial point about phones in school. What is that major crucial point?

I love technology, so it's not that I'm phobic or something. I just don't get it. Why don't schools ban them? Or if it relates to kids needing to contact parents etc for pick ups, why can't they have them when school finishes?

I am prepared to be told I have missed the point, and then some.

"If kids aren't allowed it, they will just have to wait till they get home."

Rather a big assumption there, isn't there? If something goes pearshaped with my son's travel arrangements, he wouldn't get home. He's far from having the longest journey among even his close friends.

I'm a teacher and allow phones to be used in class - kids can take pics of the board with their homework written on it or notes they find useful but haven't written down for whatever reason.

Providing phones are left in bags and turned off in lessons I don't see the issue. However I do teach in a naice school where younger pupils (yrs 7-9) hand their phones to the front office and it's only the older ones who have them.

sheitgeist, that's my default, private, 'oh fgs bloody mobile phones in school, ban them' reactionary view. Embarrassing as it is to admit it, I am actually going to say the following ...'we didn't have 'em in my day' etc etc.

I think I just wanted to get a truer picture of what goes on. One or two issues over the years with friends who have older children have lead me to the view that it was sometimes the schools being wimpy about it, as if they didn't want to take on and challenge the phones in school issue. But it seems they do exert some control after all.

As said, I'm not against progress, I just wonder if this is representative of progress? But it's very hard to argue that without coming across as an old gimmer.

But you're right though, Peppermint we did manage fine without them! I think plentiful public payphones may have helped though.

Its sad, that things that never existed until recently suddenly become essential, but I think most secondary schools are pretty good at controlling their use. The threat of confiscation is enough to keep the pupils in check!

DS is yr8 - age 12. We don't allow him a phone, mainly because he's not sensible enough not to lose it and because he's not very well behaved and is not getting a privilege for nothing. He has internet access at home and certainly doesn't need a smartphone. They wouldn't be allowed in school anyway.

He has a taxi to school so doesn't need it then, and if he's getting the bus back, then there is an incentive to catch the bus, otherwise he will have to use a phone box, something of course he had no idea about when I explained it to him. Or he would have to walk - 6 miles so not enticing. Much better to ensure you don't miss the bus.

He has an emergency 60p in his bag for making a call from a public phone box (he might have other money too, I don't mean he only has 60p!). On a couple of occasions he has been allowed to call from the school office, but this is on school business. I hate to sound like a dinosaur but when I was 12, I had a two bus 15 mile journey, a spare 2p for a phone box and always managed perfectly well, and I would expect a modern child to do so too.

Ds is allowed to use his phone in school during lessons sometimes, they are mini computers after all.

They are really useful as kids get older and are out and about more independently.

It's hard to imagine if your child is only 7,I seem to remember sucking my teeth about similar things when ds was little but really by the time they are 13 they aren't really kids any more, they are young adults that need guidance but it's amazing how independent they become. It's also best to pick your battles and really ime you want as little as possible for your teen to resent you for and rebel against. I do NOT mean you give in to everything but by 13 they will have their own money so it's quite possible they could by their own phone. Make sure you aren't just saying no for the sake of it.

If there were phone boxes on every corner then out would be a different story but I can't remember the last time I saw one,I don't think we have them whether I live!

Phones are to be in bags during school time unless otherwise instructed.

PeppermintPasty - why is it a problem to you if my dd has a mobile phone at school? How does this impact on you in any way? Just curious, you are well within your rights to prevent and ban your dc form owning a mobile phone if you so wish.

A lot of childen will not understand how to use a public pay phone as they have never been in such a contraption as they are not around or to be found. Other dc may not even know their parents phone number of by heart - do you know your dp or best friends mobile number of by heart -i don't.

Accept that the world has moved on a couple or three chapters and don't prevent your dc moving if they so wish to move with the times

dont see the big deal really.

not allowed to use them in class for secret recordings etc is fine, but what difference does it make to anyone if there is a mobile at the bottom of their bag?

my kids are not bothered about them anyway. but they are still young at 12 and 11.

Quite often the school office will be closed but after school activities will be still taking place, so not always easy to pop to the office to make a call. You will be amazed at how often you will yell 'what time am I picking you up?'as they leave the house, and the reply will be 'I dunno, when it finishes I'll ring you!'

when dd left primary i was like, hang on what on earth does she NEED a phone for.
She doesn't NEED a phone, just the same as i don't really NEED a phone, but it's a normal social accepted part of our world now. There are alot of things we don't need, but we have them.

By the time dd was in 2nd year of secondary she had her own android phone, not my make do one. They allow the use of phones at her school, during breaks. By not having them policed i do think it takes the shine off them, in that they don't have to hide them, take batteries out and all that.

It's not really as specific as that ivykaty, it really isn't! But I did wonder, hence the reason for starting this thread, if my generalised 'ban 'em' instinct was BU. That's all. Plus I'm genuinely curious about how it all works in practice.

I'm a teacher. If phones are seen in my school they are confiscated.

However, I find them very useful to use in class. Students often want to take photos of work, particularly a level. They are really helpful, if I have given the class handouts, and they have all lost them. The ones who've lost theirs can take photos of the handout.

When I was 12 there was a phone box on every corner - even more when private companies were allowed to manage them. Now the world expects you to have a phone.

However, you don't need a smart phone. A £20 Nokia 105 allows you to text and make calls.

Whether smart phones are a good or bad idea depends on what they are used for.

At DSs school phones have to be kept in lockers during the day for Y7 - 9, and permission sought from a teacher if they need to make a call during the day (eg sports practice cancelled, extra music rehearsal). Older kids can have them but have them turned off in class.
It does seem to be expected that the children will have a phone as for sports fixtures, or performances away from school parents are told that DCs will ring when leaving to give a pick up time at school.
One of DSs DT projects this term was to make a stand for his phone!!
It has proved very useful for transport mishaps too.
It also means I can text him during the day so that he knows if my plans have been upset so can't pick him up etc.

Dds school ban them despite many needing to get there by bus. She hides an old dinosaur phone (no Internet) at the bottom of the bag and if it gets confiscated oh well.

The amount of times I have texted my children about picking them up from school and heard three different text alerts coming from three different bedrooms

Ds1 isn't taking his phone at the moment as he is doing mocks and worries about being disqualified!!

Dd has just got a new phone and is not letting it out of her sight!

Ds2 was videoing his friends working!!

A phone is not just for DC to contact their parents but also parents to contact their DC. My DCs school is enormous with lots more pupils than a primary school - if I need to contact them to change arrangement for picking them up, or because I'm running late, it is very hard for anyone to get a message to them (even find them sometimes when a teacher is off sick so they are in an unexpected place).
Cyberbullying doesn't just happen in school time, or even just using mobiles, there is email, facebook, tumblr etc. etc. And less savoury sites too. It is something your DC will have to learn to deal with and to not engage in. Its part of growing up nowadays. And yes the school should treat it just as bullying - my DCs' school does, but a lot of schools still seem to act as though their responsibility stops at the school gate.

We got DS a phone at Y5. Because he cycles a mile and a half to school and we wanted some way for him to contact us if he had an accident/puncture/decided to pop in to his friend's house on the way home. I imagine the same reasons apply to lots of secondary school children.

Also, the whole phone box thing did rather depend on someone being at home to answer the phone.

I totally get the travel issue, and tbf, most of the others too. There's no way a dc should be without some form of contact if cycling alone or whatever.

Thanks all, very interesting. I am so totally over my ban 'em knee jerk reaction

PeppermintPasty in practice parenting teens can mean you have a daily battle and obile phones at school is not worth a battle - there are bigger battles to be won such as sex, drugs and drinking, these have to be sorted and avoided - so mobile phones is way down the list

thats the reality of parents life with teens. I am happy for my dd not to be smoking….taking drugs although there has been experiments with drinking and partys

My ds is in year 8 and I got him a standard touch screen phone when he started secondary. We live the other side of town to his school and he cycles everyday. His phone is for my peace of mind if he has an accident. His phone is always switched off and he very rarely uses it.
His school allows phones but they must stay in their lockers and be switched off in school hours. If not they are confiscated.

In a city where pupils like in walking distance it is one thing, but where pupils travel long rural journeys alone and in the dark it is another.
school likes it too if they have to shut early they don't have to contact hundreds of parents, the kids can do it themselves.