eSchoolNews has an article about New York City schools considering a plan to have students stow their cell phones in a locker on their way into school.
New York City school officials are taking some heat for a proposed solution to the city’s controversial ban on student cell phones in schools. The proposal would have students leave their cell phones in special lockers outside their schools, and students likely would pay 25 or 50 cents to use the lockers each day.
Um, yeah. That’ll work. Not only take away the tools with which most teens communicate and learn, but charge them for the privilege of not having them. How about this…put a locker at the door for them to stow all their textbooks, let the cell phones inside and teach them how to use them to access all the info that’s in the books.
And Tom Hoffman (who is in the lead for most posts of 2007) writes about danah boyd’s predictions about social networking. In the snip Tom pulls out, danah says:
I believe that teenagers are the reason that mobile will happen sooner than we think…I think that mobile social network-driven systems will look very different than web-based ones but the fundamentals of “friends” and “messages” and some form of presence-conveying “profile” will be core to the system.
If you read the whole post, however, you’ll see that danah is steeling herself for some “blood baths” this year involving “hyper-visible examples of bad teen behavior.” This is part my worry too, that instead of looking at these incidents as a call to educate our students to use these tools more effectively, it will be fodder for schools to simply clamp down even more. Part of why I think this will get worse before it gets better.
But on the cell phone as social networking tool idea, Tom follows up with some interesting thinking about why this might be a good thing:
Having kids’ social networking move onto their phones would be good for schools. Students not using school computers and the school network for this stuff will cut liability concerns and filtering paranoia. Plus it just seems like a better fit for the role cellphones play in kids’ lives.
I wonder, however, if that wouldn’t then really necessitate schools having kids check their phones at the door.
Finally, I find this snip from the Economist Magazine’s “The World in 2007” issue (as blogged by Smart Mobs)
Internet-capable mobile phones will be revolutionary, at least for those who can read and have the money to buy data bundles. The humble SMS will have an even greater effect on East Africa in 2007. Innovative uses of SMS will allow people to move money by text messages; to receive information on, say, maize prices, along with tips on planting; and to recieve medical advice, a particular benefit to those living with tuberculosis or AIDS.
It’s becoming clearer and clearer to me that the convergence of all of this will fit in our pockets. It has to. The culture is demanding mobile computing, and it’s being driven by our kids. And I think we need to start looking at ways to leverage that ability.
Where to start? Experiment. A first step might be to go to Mogopop and put together a lesson that can upload to an iPod. Not a phone, I know, but that ability will be here sooner than you think. It’s an easy way of getting your head around how it might play out. Any other ideas?
(Photo “Penguin Cell” by Pepewk.)
Technorati Tags: education, learning, cell_phone
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I have a feeling that, an occasional purge (or unusually permissive school) notwithstanding, cell phones will remain in a perpetual “don’t ask, don’t tell” grey area. Technically against the rules but tolerated, giving some plausible undeniably for schools on the legal issues.
[...] Cell Phones and Education Cell phones are often seen as bad or students in schools. At Murray, we have a policy that they are not allowed to be in classes. I agree with that policy. They are too much of distraction, and students are too often using them just to communicate. Imagine, though, that they could be used for something else. Considering all the mobile web gadgets that are available now, could cell phones be used for educational purposes? I saw an interesting article on this today that speak to this phenomenon. Wil Richardson mentioned this today because New York is thinking about instituting a policy where students have to leave their cell phones in a locker before they enter school. He states: It’s becoming clearer and clearer to me that the convergence of all of this will fit in our pockets. It has to. The culture is demanding mobile computing, and it’s being driven by our kids. And I think we need to start looking at ways to leverage that ability. [...]
Sorry, but I must disagree with this position. This is just WAY too removed from reality, IMHO. Give the kids internet capable cell phones with open internet access and expect to get ANYTHING accomplished? Not on the planet *I* live on. We can’t even get adults to sit in front of a computer during an Internet-based training without them sending and responding to emails - and then asking a question about something that they would have known had they not been distracted. We think kids will do better?
There are just too many holes in this position, guys. Bring in cell phones and watch test scores plummet within a week’s time. And don’t hang your hat on the “Let’s not get hung up on test scores” mantra. It’s reality. Another reality is that kids will learn how to use their cell phones on their own if motivated to do so. It’s not rocket science. In the meantime you’ll not find a single curriculum director nor superintendent who would believe that allowing them to bring in cell phones with unrestricted use would bring ANY positive results. This just never touches ground.
::throwing in MY 2.5 cents worth::
[...] After meeting with Lee and Debra today and talking about projects we could develop for the iPods, I think Will Richardson’s post today is very timely! He writes: [...]
I think your post is right on the money. I think in the next couple of years we are going to run into a total culture clash between schools and students’ devices(whatever those devices end up being in two years).
I think we do have a tremendous responsibility to help teach responsible behavior of whatever device it is. Maybe having students have their phones off at appropriate times is part of teaching them how to use them responsibly.
And maybe this isn’t an either or–can’t we require phones to be off, but allow students to use them in a particular lesson for a particular purpose? Students are certainly intelligent enough to make those distinctions between an acceptable use and an unacceptable one.
And this isn’t just about students…how about adults using devices inappropriately? Like the person I saw on his blackberry at a funeral recently during the service, or a parent at a college orientation talking out loud on her phone during the presentation?
I just think as educators that we can help students explore all these technological tools in constructive, educational ways. That might even push the envelope with students–maybe it never occurred to them to use their phone as a learning tool? (other than trading answers in text messages…) We have our students store their login ids in their cell phones, because we know the phone is one thing they’ll usually have with them at school. That seems like a constructive use of the phone.
I know we are trying to wall out the outside electronic world a lot of the time, but I think there will be some transformational technology that completely breaks through the walls of the school building and we need to be prepared to address it.
Our world has changed, irrevocably. The best thing I think we can do for students is to help them be responsible and thoughtful users of whatever tools and resources they have.
This actually reminds me of the Wall Street Journal article last year about the school that was allowing open book tests, internet use during tests, and use of cell phones because they felt like what they needed to be testing was something you couldn’t look up online, and that students were secretly using all these tools anyway.
Interesting question….
Believe that the technology is here. I am currently using a smartphone with my verizon plan. I chose it because it has WiFi capability which allows me to access info without the $60/month additional charge for internet. It comes with an SD slot, is windows based and allows me to use it for data storage, mp3 player and have on several occasions opened up my SLINGBOX on it and watched my television from home [even the Video on Demand and Center Ice Package-(great for when you are out of town and need to catch the game!)] Think of the possibilities for using this smartphone in class!
As far as worrying about keeping the attention of kids, and worrying about them communicating with each other. My teachers’ shared the same concern with my parents. Only instead of a phone, they were upset because I was constantly doodling and writing notes to my friends and passing them along. Bottom line, the technology is not going away. It is only going to get better. The question we have to ask ourselves is “How many times in education will we be forced to play catch up?”
Will, Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about the role of Google on the Internet. Google owns the sign posts that direct people where they are going and the advertising signs throughout much of cyber space. I think they are too smart to let convergence pass them by, but I’m not sure how they are going to manage it. What are your thoughts? I’m also a little concerned with all of this talk about convergence. What’s the point of it. The goal of school should not simply be to learn to look up information. Instead it should be to learn to use information constructively. That said, how do you imagine that cell phones are going to continue to evolve so that students can use them to manipulate information not just look information up?
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I agree with a lot of what Carolyn has said; in particular about the needs to encourage children to learn to use them appropriately. I’m not sure of the exact position in UK schools, though I think that it’s generally a case that students at secondary school can have them, but have to keep them turned off during the day. The recent news reports about the possibility of bans seem to concentrate on “happy slapping” - and so some are suggesting that students should be allowed basic (non-camera) phones, but not more sophisticated ones. That would mean, of course, that some of the educational advantages you could get from an internet enabled phone are less likely.
The problem I see with encouraging children to use their phones to learn is the increasing divide between those who have top of the range phones - can afford to use the internet etc., etc, and those who either don’t have a phone, or who have a basic model on a pay as you go, purely for emergency purposes. Or kids who don’t have them.
Would schools provide phones for those who can’t afford them? What about kids whose parents (or, indeed, themselves) prefer not to have them? Clearly those are likely to be a small minority, but I have very clear memories of friends when I was a child who didn’t have a TV … )
[...] Lots of folks (will, tom, danah) today are talking about mobile phones and use by students. I don’t have a whole lot to add to his except to note that besides the Wii, the most sought after and received gift of upper elementary students at Lewis Elementary this holiday season was a mobile phone. Parents see them as a necessary tool in an age of latch key kids going home alone. Also I’m finding an increasing number of families that are going through domestic issues, where one parents buys a phone for their child as a way to keep in contact because of the domestic situation such as where the parents have split up. [...]
[...] There is a lot of play in the blog world about mobile technology (Tim, Will, etc..). [...]
[...] (Link to Mogopop via weblogg-ed, thank you!) [...]
[...] Cell Phone Ban in New York, New Proposal, Takes from the edublogosphere Will Richardson Danah Boyd Tom Hoffman [...]
[...] Will Richardson reacts to the possibility that NYC public school students will have to pay 50 cents to put their cell phones into a locker at the start of school each day. He writes, Um, yeah. That’ll work. Not only take away the tools with which most teens communicate and learn, but charge them for the privilege of not having them. How about this…put a locker at the door for them to stow all their textbooks, let the cell phones inside and teach them how to use them to access all the info that’s in the books. [...]