Mobile phone ban in school

[Scalagala]

Post inspired by comments on other thread. Would you support a blanket ban on mobile phones in your school? This means no mobile phones - including brick phones - to be allowed in school at all, so hence no access on the way home / on to other activities.
YABU - support a blanket ban.
YANBU - schools could adopt other methods such as pouches or phones off during school day.

I’m used to be Chemistry teacher ban them it’s ridiculous

This is true.

But as teachers we also know how many kids try it on during the school day to get out of doing stuff they don't want to do.

I am always looking at attendance patterns as part of my job and there are plenty of children who suddenly develop a migraine or stomach ache before PE/Maths/Spanish or whatever every single week, or who are persistently missing lessons when there are assessments due to 'tummy ache'.

When kids try to bypass the school office by calling home then we can also miss these patterns and be prevented in our ability to effectively safeguard children. There are also huge problems in my school with kids going straight to the toilet to call home when disciplined by a staff member, sobbing down the phone about Miss X being really mean, which then means parents are phoning and emailing to find out what's going on, when the reality is that if the child hadn't had access to their phone, they would have had time to calm down, have a reasonable discussion, feel much better about things, and probably have forgotten about it all by the end of the school day. Having an immediate means to call home regularly inflames non-issues into drama that again wastes staff time, causes them a lot of stress, and is another reason why so many teachers want to leave the profession.

Therefore, parents enabling all of this behaviour by encouraging their children to call home rather than go to the school office is not helpful.

I very much doubt a child would ever become so physically unwell as to need an ambulance without a teacher noticing or believing them. Concerns around children's health are not a valid reason for not banning phones.

My DS's school used to have a very sensible policy, whereby phones had to be off and in a bag and could only be used during breaktime/lunch and before or after school.

They - and the government - have now taken this facility away from him because other teenagers cannot be trusted to act responsibly. It's discipline 101: punish/sanction/restrict people who can't be trusted, and then DON'T punish/sanction/restrict those who can.

He's never had a detention or bad behaviour point either, but maybe they should give him these, as he is the same age as the children who do earn plenty of them - and we obviously find it preferable and fairer to lump people into big, clumsy demographics - assuming that the worst-behaved are the standard for everybody - rather than treating people as individuals.

What's ridiculous - could you elaborate?

Maybe we should blanket-ban everybody from ever doing chemistry experiments, as some people choose to make and use dangerous bombs.

It's happening in all Edinburgh schools from August. Pilot in 2 high schools has been very successful. 94% support from parents. Costing 400k

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgrkye941veo

Those can be sorted with parental controls.

I do hope when Government ban social media they will allow parents to have control until 16, the law currently states children at 13 can turn perental controls off.

Thats a massive issue

Yes, but the world has changed to a digital / contactless one - probably short sightedly, but you can’t just put the genie back
in the bottle. There used to be public phone boxes, so you could phone your parents with your after school plans - now there are barely any anywhere. They tap in and out with their phones on public transport etc etc

My daughter’s school is quite remote, so a phone for the journey has been invaluable. Phones haven’t been allowed to be seen in her school for a couple of years now. Oddly, having had a physical bus pass since she started, it’s becoming electronic from September. Most of the children catch the bus, they come into the school grounds to collect the children.

I 100% disagree with this.

Please read The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt.

Increasingly research is showing us that the use of screens and social media has fundamentally altered children's brains, making it difficult for them to focus for longer periods of time, form meaningful relationships, and leaving them in a state of almost constant anxiety. They are 'forever elsewhere', as Haidt says, because their lives are lived online rather than in the here and now.

Smartphones and social media go hand in hand and they have collectively contributed towards the destruction of an entire generation's mental health and ability to cognitively engage with the world around them. We are only just now starting to see the consequences of this technology on our brains and I genuinely believe that history will look back on this period of time as an experiment that had truly disastrous consequences.

Parents really need to educate themselves (and I don't mean that in the 'educate yourself' patronising way) about this. Now we are starting to understand the consequences of the technology we have invented, we owe it to the next generations to mitigate the damage we have caused, not just shrug our shoulders and say 'oh well, that's progress, we can't stop it now'.

Maybe this is a situation which will partly right itself with the SM ban on under16s. Obviously this will require parental support, but if the kids can't get on TikTok etc, the appeal of a phone diminishes.

I work in a school and phones are a problem. But at the same time we send pupils their homework on class charts, the kids check their timetables on the phone, sometimes if we can't book a laptop trolley, kids are allowed to use their phones for research in the lesson. And we are a rural school - children need to be able to contact their parents on the way home. I wouldn't have liked my own dc to be uncontactable and therefore would not impose that on other people's children.

The thing is, parents are all very much:"well MY child wouldn't get it out in class. " But they do. It's an addiction. I'm not even sure some of them realise they're doing it, but you see them reaching for their blazer pocket almost absentmindedly.

I always assumed mine were the law abiding type, but ds cheerfully tells me now all the times he got away with using his phone in school. And the times it was confiscated.... but returned because school couldn't contact me....because they couldn't get through to me, due to me teaching!

Well that’s only if it’s in their blazer pocket, isn’t it? Mine puts hers in her locker in the morning and takes it out on her way home, so there’s no temptation. She’s a proper rule follower and takes the ‘not seen or heard’ policy extremely seriously!

DD's school has started using phone pouches. Only real downside is that they regularly text to tell me she isn't in school (when she is). Before the ban I would have messaged her to find out what was going on, not I call the office tell them I'm sure she is in school, but can they please track her down and reassure me that she is safe. Makes life more difficult for them.(most of the kids have a brick phone which they put in the pouch and keep their phone in bag turned off.

Anyone who has health problems or is in an accident needs access to a phone and 999. So your argument doesn’t work.

I think the blanket ban means no exceptions. There is always someone who will say yes but my child needs (insert your own excuse)

I find phones to be invaluable for games at the end of the lesson like Blooket and for when research is needed and we have no laptops or for when work is complete and I need them to use 5 mins on sparks, Seneca, educake or duo lingo. I have also allowed phones at KS4 in study periods where they are revising or to allow music while revising.
These are replaceable - a teacher-hosted Kahoot instead, take a private reader out, play some soothing music myself while they work, but the majority can be trusted - including asking to text home for Parent pay to have money put on, kits needed or times changing.
I have and will confiscate phones if needed and I know of magnetic pouches in other schools being the norm now but the only concern I have where a ban makes sense is when pupils film things or take pictures without consent. An outright ban would stop that completely.

I can live with or without them. I can teach with or without them. I will always be reasonable when faced with a reasonable request in any case, including phoning someone when asked.

In my children's school they have an equipment check in form. Anyone who has a phone with them, have to put it in their locker for the day.

Any phones caught in pockets, which are usually fairly visible are confiscated for 48 hours, same if it's seen outside of form. No doubt there will be the odd daredevil who might shove it down their top or something but would be hard to secretly message in class. (Obviously could try sneak to toilet) All bags have to be under the desk once their equipment is out.

Appreciate not all schools will have the same phone policy and may not have the budget to introduce them so totally get it from this stand point.

This is exactly why they shouldn’t be in schools at all. I despair. They can sit and read for 5 minutes!!!! Or you can think of a 5 minute filler. So so lazy.

My DS left school 3 years ago. His school had no phones policy as soon as he crossed the school threshold. Phone had to be put in his bag and not taken out until he crossed the threshold to go home. If the phone was taken out of said bag during the day it was confiscated and the parent had to go to the school and pick it up. Simple rules to follow, he had his phone for bus ticket.

Yes they are not watched for every minute of the day so some probably do get their phones out but it treating them as individuals, learning to grow up and follow rules. Don’t see why the phone need to be literally locked away!

I have to agree. This has become so normalised people can’t see what is happening.

Good for you. You can't envisage a situation where a phone might prove useful, let alone something more for a child?

No, I wouldn’t support a blanket ban on phones in schools. It’s a massive safeguarding disaster waiting to happen. I fully support a blanket ban on phones DURING the school day, but not for them not to be allowed on the premises at all.

Some kids travel quite far for school and a lot rely on public transport. If Alex’s bus is delayed or there’s been a situation meaning none of the trains are running and Billy is stranded, I would want to know about it, because even if I wasn’t able to do anything about it (IE pick them up myself), at least I wouldn’t be worrying and terrified that something sinister has happened. Plus, I can speak to them and advise them if need be.

People that harp on about the ‘good old days’ and we were all fine without phones, just frustrate me to be honest. First of all, back then safeguarding really wasn’t much of a thing above the base level. Things were normalised that have, rightly in most cases, since been curbed. In the 60s, 70s & 80s kids were generally given a lot more freedom and it wasn’t uncommon for children as young as 7 going out to play with friends with no adult supervision. We now know that this isn’t appropriate, as sadly some people (mainly men of course 🙄) have bad intentions. Nowadays it’s expected that even secondary age children have more supervision when developing independence. You’ve also got to remember that there were public phone boxes no more than half a mile away from most given places, so phones were available and kids could connect their parents at ease. Because the majority of people now have phones, most phone boxes have been dismantled (my local one went just before the pandemic). So, it’s not as simple as using a payphone, as they are becoming increasingly obsolete and I don’t particularly think we should be encouraging our kids to ask strangers to borrow their phones as that opens a whole can of potential risk.

My solution would be phone pouches, that would be locked as soon as they enter the school gates, and can be opened as they leave. I don’t have an issue with brick phones only rule in general (that’s the only phone mine would be getting until they were at least 13), but I feel that it’s more pressure on parents who already own a smartphone and having a locked phone pouch would cover all scenarios.

Where do you live? I have never been anywhere in the UK that you cant buy a manual ticket. Even unmanned stations let you buy on train or on exit if the machine is out of order.

A safeguarding disaster- seriously!!!

You do realise primary school
kids are walking home from school alone without phones in the latter years- quite safely!

I grew up in the 70s and 80s and don’t remember a safeguarding disaster on an epic scale. It’s madness and no wonder we have so many MH problems. Kids are being lead to believe that they can’t do anything without a phone welded to their hands. Even sitting for 5 minutes in a classroom , or coping with a delayed bus is apparently impossible!

Midlands bus passes (cheaper than daily ticket) are all on an app.

You can get a physical smartcard for your West Midlands bus pass. Transport for West Midlands (TfWM) issues a plastic smartcard known as a Swift card. It functions like a handheld travelcard—you simply load your tickets, passes, or pay-as-you-go credit onto it and tap it on the card reader when boarding the bus.