Does your child's school restrict mobile phone usage?

[Toughlove70]

Do any of your kids' schools ban phones during school day including breaks? What are the penalties if pupils don't comply? Can you advise the name of the school so we can check the policy? We are in Scotland and virtually no schools ban phones and they say it is not effective in practise... we disagree... thanks

London. At all schools husband and I work in and have DC at phones have to be kept out of sight. One has yonder pouches so they are locked away. Confiscated if seen and parent has to collect. It’s effective. One local school bans them even in bags and any infringements are treated on a par with smoking or other banned stuff. It can be done and it has made things better for both teachers and pupils. I remember when phones were allowed and it caused a lot of problems. Different rules for 6th form in most of these places.

I think these are all questions not for me, but for the school, whose policy it is, and who say they are very happy with how it's operating.

They get their phones back in afternoon form time, immediately before they go home.

deeprealisation this is a phone locker
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Storage-Cabinet-Examination-Transparent-Numbered/dp/B092D34RQG/ref=asc_df_B092D34RQG/?tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=535915448592&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=422532820657742593&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9046675&hvtargid=pla-1414461990406&mcid=c6a3359bf9de3052a1614df5e43116bf&th=1

Every form room has one (so pretty much every classroom)
The children put their phones in during form time (8.30) and then they are unlocked and given back at the end of the school day, so at the end of each day the children collect their phones. (It's amazing how PE kits / coats / blazers etc are frequently forgotten but phones are always remembered )

It means that the phones are locked away, and they are see through so everyone can see the phones are safe.

Not to be turned on during school time.

@onetwothreeee thx! Never seen one before. I can see it would work in some schools. Ours however would need a wholescale reorganisation of how they operate the school as

1. Form rooms are not necessarily the teachers actual classroom as the forms are grouped in areas of the school and teachers like the 10 PE teachers have form rooms elsewhere.
2. they don't have form time at the end of the day (pm registers are done in the class).
3. The kids don't do lessons in their form groups and are mixed up / streamed / in sets etc

If sports teams or trips are leaving a bit early which is quite frequent, they'd disturb classes. Same if sent home early / in isolation etc

1. One day a week they have assembly not form

The main thing is no2 & 4 as ours don't ever return to form room after 9 and form only 4 days

DD (Yr6) 's school have a total ban, including turned off in their school bag except for one girl who gets the bus into town to a music lesson straight after school and whose dad is one of the governors

DS (Yr7) is allowed phone at school. Each teacher has a basket on their desk and they have to put their phone in there for the duration of the lesson. They are allowed to use them at break. The PE teacher also has a basket in the gym and they put all valuables in it rather than leave them in the changing room.

Yes they do the seen but not heard measure. Removing phone to be collected at the end of the day if it's seen. It's early days so I haven't heard of any confiscations so far.

They also have to hand it in to go to have a toilet pass. So they can't use it then.

Not sure what happens regarding measuring blood sugar - presumably it's done the way it was before there was an app for it?

Some insulin pumps and Libre blood monitoring devices are linked to smartphones via bluetooth technology – my daughter's phone alarms if her readings are going too high or too low so she can correct by altering the flow of insulin she is receiving. She therefore needs it with her, and on, at all times.

@Puffykins I presume schools make exceptions for DCs in these circumstances, it probably affects a very small number of DCs at present, though those numbers will grow as this tech becomes more widespread.

Dc with libre devices are definitely allowed phones with them in my dcs (very strict) school.

to be fair pretty much all of that applies to my childrens school

It means at the end of the day they go back to the room they do their morning register and collect their phones. There is no form session, they are not registered they just return and collect their stuff before their journey home.

Throughout the day the children are in different rooms from their phones and other children are in the room that their phones are locked in.

It just means there is a space where all the students safely leave their phones alone, and switched off, all day, and then return to for as long as it takes to collect their phone and walk out at the end of the day.
Their lockers are also in or near the rooms they take the register in so are likely to be going to their locker to collect their morning books / PE kits etc etc anyway.

If the children are leaving school early for sports fixtures, they are allowed to collect their phones early so they are with them at the fixture. (and the phones are expected to remain in their bags).

Our school have been implementing this for at least 7 years and it works pretty well IMO

Our school says mobiles are not to be used in the school day and if children have them they must be turned off or set to silent.

The policy states that if a phone is seen/heard, then it will be confiscated and only returned at the end of the day to a parent/carer. The reality is that many children use them at break/lunch and just hide from teachers. If teachers do see/hear a phone, some teachers take it from the child, others just tell them to put it away/turn it off.

Some teachers tell the kids to take a photo of homework on their phones or use apps in lessons on their phones.

All rules are inconsistent.

Thx @onetwothreeee Yes we'd have to do similar and ensure each room was manned at home time for 15 min to allow them to return & collect. Not all would be. Only the staff would know if feasible

All the late kids would have to take them to dorm room too haha. Not sure about assembly day as they go direct to the hall

My DCs went to different secondary schools. They were allowed to take phones to school but they had to be turned off and in their bag once on the premises and not to be touched until outside the gates or they could go to the office and get permission to make a call or send a text if necessary. This meant that they could contact me easily if they needed to. They both had a 20 minute walk to and from school and phone boxes are non existent around here. DS suffers from anxiety so the ability to listen to music or a podcast in his walk was therapeutic for him. He was also allowed to listen to music when in the SEN “calm” room using his own device.

There is a school nearby which has a very draconian policy, page 5 of this policy - https://www.stmcomprehensive.org/download?file=https%3A%2F%2Fstmcomp.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fdocument%2FBehaviour-Policy.pdf%3Ft%3D1688378167

No electronic devices AT ALL. They do bag checks and even a phone which is turned off, “dumb” (ie a Nokia brick capable of calls and tests only) warrants punishment. This means the pupils cannot contact anyone if there are problems to or from school. A while ago there was an issue where, after school, there was a huge accident so buses weren’t running. There were children unable to call parents. There were children asking strangers on the street to call someone for them because they didn’t know how they were going to get home. My friend went out in the car searching for her daughter because she wasn’t home and had no way of contacting her.

I agree with no phone use IN school but these days it is not appropriate to leave vulnerable youngsters with no way to call home.

When I was at school there were four phone boxes on my route home and I had a phone card or could reverse the charges if necessary. It’s the 21st century and phone policies need to reflect that.

It would be interesting to see what these schools with very strict policies would do if faced with a DC who uses their phone as part of their health care regime, as recommended by their consultant and healthcare team… They would surely have to make an exception.

I am not in the UK but in the US and my 12 year old’s school has quite a strict no phone policy. Phones are handed in at the start of the day and placed in a storage locker and he collects them at 3:30. The school also has a no smartphone rule. It means at break time they do have to talk to each other and chat.

Other than, say, diabetes, how are phones helping with health care routines?

Yes,
My childrens school had a child with diabetes and her blood sugar was monitored by her app.

Yes, her phone was allowed to be on her person, due to the medical need but she wouldnt be allowed to "use her phone".
(and given that all of her friends phones would be in the phone lockers, it's not like she needs to interact with her school friends as none of them are online)

So yes, when a childs life literally depends on the app on their phone being in close proximity to a medical sensor attached to their body, the school have the common sense to make an exception.

I'd imagine such thing would be included on their EHCP so the school would have to follow it.

We have my dd use a smartwatch that monitors her o2 levels. It isn’t strictly necessary, but she has had a couple of silent asthma attacks and they are really scary.

We could have gotten her a medical device that did that, but a smartwatch doesn’t make her stand out. When you have an illness it can be very stigmatizing and othering. Many teens don’t want any attention drawn, even hiding symptoms to their own detriment. Instead of the weird kid with an o2 monitor, she is the kid with the nice watch. It helps.

Phones have to be off in the bottom of your bag. If they are even in your trouser pocket they are confiscated. They are very strict with it, no phones at break or lunch, CCTV and teachers roaming but also on all gates when students are coming in or leaving.

The original policy was phone taken for 48 hours and had to be collected by a parent! This made sure that children abided by the rules, this is now 24 hours and the children can collect it at the end of the next school day. Children can argue that their bus ticket app is on their phone but school would argue you know the rules and if getting home is dependent on your phone you shouldn't have had it out during the school day. It works.

😀@onetwothreeee very true, not much point being the only person who is allowed to have a phone as there's no one to send messages to!

Obviously making exceptions in these circumstances is, as you rightly say, just common sense. I was merely wondering at PPs who have said their school allows 'no exceptions' as clearly they have to make some exceptions…

Incidentally, neither of my two DCs who have T1 diabetes ever had an EHCP or any kind of formal plan regarding their condition, or the management thereof.

In my DD school Phones are not to be used during school hours, they must be in your bag and if seen are confiscated. However kids use them constantly and the school insists on using homework and timetable apps and if sick or need to contact parents the school asks kids to call us on their mobile phones which to me contradicts the whole no phones in school policy. It’s a mess and I wish it was stricter about phone use. Toilets are becoming no go zones due to vaping and phone use.

Toilets are becoming no go zones due to vaping and phone use.

The two things that are ‘sold’ to our children. It shouldn’t be up to schools to find a fix or manage these things. Depressing stuff.

Mobile phones & electronic devices should not be visible anywhere on the College site between the hours of 8.00 am and 3.30 pm (school day is 08.20-15.00) unless pupils are given permission by a member of staff or invited to use them as part of a lesson.

· Mobile phones and electronic devices must only be used in a classroom/teaching environment with the explicit permission and supervision of a teacher.

· If a mobile phone or electronic device is seen or heard it will be confiscated by a member of staff and a parent/carer will have to collect it from Visitor Reception. We will email as soon as possible to alert you of this.

· Refusal to hand over a mobile phone or electronic device to a member of staff will result in a pupil being sent to the Learning Hub.

· If a pupil needs to communicate with a parent/carer during the day, then they should go to Pupil Reception to request permission to do so (not during lessons).