Every fall, every teacher has to fight a few important battles with their new class of students. In my class, one battle is over bathroom use. Another is over seating assignments. A third is over small talk, especially during the first few weeks as we build class community. But increasingly, the biggest, most perpetual fight is over cell phone use.
This year, the Pew Research Center 9 in 10 American adults own a smartphoneWhile most of us can remember what life was like before the nation became addicted to smartphones, most of today’s young people are too young to remember those times. However, smartphone ownership rates among 13- to 17-year-olds are Almost the same as adultsFurthermore, smartphone use among teenagers Increasing barriers to learning.
My colleague and I teach the same group of 11th graders at a Title I high school in Oakland. My colleague teaches history and I teach science. Our group sizes are large, allowing us to build strong relationships with 60 students during the 40 weeks we spend together.
At the beginning of this year, I noticed that most of my students were extremely attached to their phones. So, around the middle of last year, I decided to survey them about how much time they were spending on screens. Not unexpectedly, the findings were puzzling. Students were unashamedly reciting numbers like “8 hours and 43 minutes per day.” The most across the group? Just under 12 hours per day. The least? An impressive 2 hours and 50 minutes. And the week? The majority totaled over 40 hours, which is more than a week spent staring at a screen.
For teachers, this is not only exhausting but also demoralizing. 77% of public schools There are no schools in our high school that regulate the use of cell phones during class. Controversial Issues In my school and other schools across the country, School shootings raise concerns about school safetyParents are also worried about being unable to contact their children, but while this is a legitimate concern for many, teachers are also battling signs of infection. Poor mental health, Declining engagement Overall Lack of social interaction with peers Among our students.
For teachers who stand in front of audiences where they can’t put their phones down, the loss of student focus is a huge burden. Speaking to other staff at the school, the majority would like a school-wide cell phone usage policy. Many academic groups at my school have teachers who are adamant about implementing a policy, with varying degrees of success. Teachers who don’t want a policy often cite a lack of support as the main reason. This could be due to unresponsive or unsupportive administration, a lack of clear results across the school, or a lack of consistency across classes.
Each of these factors leads teachers to fight the same battle every day, which not only takes away from our overall teaching time but also impacts our relationships with our students, which is the only reason many of us stay in the classroom. The lowest paying, hardest school districts to teach in In the Bay Area.
Even if you maintain a clear structure in your classroom, you have to re-teach that structure every day because students enter seven different spaces with different policies and expectations throughout the day, then see their teacher again. Without a school-wide policy, not only will students be confused, but they won’t truly understand unless it has an impact outside of their particular classroom.
A changing landscape
In my experience as a teacher, the classroom landscape was definitely different before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Before the infamous Zoom Year, cell phones were a minor issue. Students generally accepted the redirection, and there was an overall culture of understanding how to behave in the classroom. Often, when students finished an assignment or needed a break, they would chat with me about their weekend, tell me about events in their lives, like a morning spent fishing with their dad or their sister’s upcoming quinceañera. Sometimes, they would pull out a book or talk to a classmate. For me as a teacher, these moments were invaluable, and these little check-ins made going to work fun.
Now, things have changed. I find that students generally lack the mental strength and self-control to put down their phones. I battle every day with social media, online gambling, sports games, texting with friends, and everything else the Internet has to offer, but most of the time it’s just me and my group of 28 students. Most students seem to understand that it’s an expectation in my class, but a similar general understanding of smartphone etiquette is no longer ingrained in the school culture or this generation of students.
Instead, kids don’t see phone use as a problem; they see it as something everyone does. This creates a barrier between me and my students and highlights the many factors that drive teachers out of the profession, including increased workload and mental health. Additionally, the controversy over smartphones makes our efforts to engage kids in the classroom and create positive learning communities feel unappreciated and unvalued.
Manage expectations
Addressing this issue, combined with inconsistent school policies and excessive student smartphone use, has been an incredibly challenging part of my experience as a teacher, especially since I often spend hours on campus without interacting with other adults. If the issue plagues your teaching and has become the accepted norm among your students, you may feel alone in a losing battle and find it difficult to continue to put energy into your efforts.
Although there has been clear progress in smartphone regulation policy, In states like CaliforniaThese policies, Diversity of access to resourcesCurrent political movements, e.g. All 4 Edraising questions about the funding provided to Title I schools to maintain such policies.
Now that the school year has settled in, I am hopeful that my school will make some progress in developing sound, consistent policies that apply to all classrooms. However, The budget was drastically cutAs resources and staff to address cell phone use in classrooms and around schools are further reduced, we have adjusted our expectations in anticipation of future movement on this issue.
Once again, teachers are tasked with solving a social problem without the resources or support. Smartphone use is an issue that needs to be addressed immediately in schools to ensure this generation of kids has the focus and skills they need to succeed in society.
