The Right Amount of Cell Phone Use During the School Day Is Zero
In this video, Dr. Justin Baeder argues that any amount of student cell phone use during school is too much.
Key Takeaways
- Zero is the right number - There is no educational benefit to student phone use that can't be achieved through other means
- Responsible use is taught through abstinence, then gradual exposure - Just like other privileges, phone use should be earned outside of school, not practiced during it
- The only winning move is not to play - Schools that allow 'responsible use' spend more time managing phones than teaching
Transcript
Maybe schools shouldn't ban cell phones, but instead teach students to use them appropriately during the school day.
At least that's the argument that I've been hearing for a long time, and recently it seems like that argument has lost a lot of its credibility, right?
There was once this idea of, like, bring your own device, and this belief that we could have better education by allowing students to bring and use and educationally benefit from their cell phones.
But we know now, we're like 10 years into this, we know now that having students use their cell phones during the school day is just a disaster for learning, for behavior, for socialization, for friendships, for bullying.
So many factors have demonstrated to us that the cell phone in students' hands during the school day is as inappropriate as this.
And there was once this idea in parenting that if you wanted to keep your children from having an unhealthy relationship with that, that you would introduce it to them gradually and teach them about responsible use and things like that.
And intuitively, that idea makes a certain amount of sense.
It's kind of a European idea.
It feels kind of fancy, feels like that might be a healthier thing.
But it turns out to be just flat wrong.
Introducing your children prematurely to things that are addictive and dangerous for them turns out to not be a good thing.
And it's not how you end up with healthy habits as a young person or as an adult.
And we know this now.
There's been tons of research on All kinds of addictive things, including cell phones.
And we know that the appropriate way for students to use cell phones during the school day is not at all.
There is no useful, you know, like net positive way to use cell phones during the day.
Yes, there is a place for technology.
I think there is a place.
for learning how to use computers, learning how to use various internet services.
But the idea that we should just like have this incredibly dangerous device out all day on students' desks or in their pockets or in their hands during the school day is now unsupportable.
Let me know what you think.