Some HRM high schools are now allowing the use of “pocket technology” in the classroom as a “resource”. What happened to good old fashioned textbooks, dictionaries, and computers?
I watch kids everyday waste classroom time texting and playing games, claiming that they are doing “research”. They don’t do their work, they don’t pay attention in class and the teacher can’t take away their phones. They complain that they have too much homework and that the teacher didn’t explain any of the notions so that they can do the homework. (How can you remember if the teacher explained anything if you are too engrossed in your “pocket technology”?)
It has gotten so bad that when guest speakers come into the class, half of the students are on their phones texting/playing games while they speak. Where is the respect? Where are manners? I fear we are creating a new society bent on instant gratification, no sense of responsibility/respect/manners, and one that has the attention span of a goldfish. —Teacher Afraid For Our Future
This article appears in Mar 29 – Apr 4, 2012.
don’t worry they’ll get slammed with the useless textbooks when they hit university and they charge 600 bucks a pop for books.
Ahhh for the good old days when ‘pocket technology’ tended to mean pocket pool, at least on the dude’s side of the school.
The real irony of this is these students all seem to demand respect, and woe unto those who happen to disrespect them, while at the same time showing absolutely no respect to anyone else.
Our edcucational system certainly needs tweaking…I cant ignore the Young Offenders Act in this sense of entitlement which they flaunt.
Totally valid bitch!
Teachers also need to take more action inside the classroom to limit, as much as possible, the extent which phones are used.
I remember a time when “pocket technology” was a new windbreaker that you could stuff into it’s own mid-chest pocket and strap to your waist like a fanny pack.
http://www.k-way.ca/CLAUDE/k000030-905.jpg
i wish the teachers could do this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Bu3Z3Xdynw
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION
The “pocket technology” of the high school students to which the poster refers is simply the logical conclusion initiated by the cybernetic revolution which, in conjunction with other currents in contemporary society, has worked to privatize social life and, as a consequence, trivialize education.
Internet technology by itself is a neutral component in society but one capable of assuming any direction given the presence of those other currents which shape public opinion. Some directions are positive such as the “Arab spring,” a grass-roots movement mobilized by such pocket technology against political tyrants. However, in the absence of such a common enemy its positive effects are not as obvious. Given the pragmatic and materialistic nature of our society, current educational practice in the public schools may well be one of its victims.
Perhaps the principal cultural effect of the personal computer is the privatization and virtualization of what once was real communal social life. Every person in effect can be his own publisher – just like I’m doing now, attempting to reflect on the impact of cybernetic technology on education. But I’m talking to myself. The experience seems to be an inward-looking exercise, one that is even self-absorbed. Yes, we “communicate” on the bitchboard but the communication is “virtual,” not really “real.” Like the Arab Spring, this may well be a good thing for those who think they have something tangible to contribute to the public conversation but what about the others? What about those high school students?
Perhaps the poster, a teacher, has in fact glimpsed the future where education in that “new society” has become trivialized and where students, unable to interact in any meaningful or purposeful fashion, have become self-absorbed texters and game-players. Perhaps rather enriching their life, that “pocket technology” will ultimately lead to its impoverishment.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Instead of trying to ban the use of technology in the classroom, which is where I fear your bitch is going, perhaps some times should be set aside to deal with modern day digital etiquette, to reduce the occurance of the rudeness you have observed from time to time.
My 11 year old son has a cell phone that his school administrators (and apparently board) have “banned” while on school grounds. So at lunch time when no learning could be affected, my son isn’t allowed to communicate with me.
Is this an example of what you think would be appropriate policy?
Instead he and I just end up disregarding the opinions of the “governmental representatives” aka teachers and school administrators, for their rules at all costs mindset (which, apparently hasn’t changed since I dealt with our horrid public school system.)
So my best advice, teach, is instead of banning products, and attempting, feebly, to outstretch your affirmative arm of the government over our children with rules you haven’t thought out – give some time to figure out for yourself and your students how you can build these essential digital devices into the learning environment or curriculum.
Otherwise you’re fucked.
You can either fight the inevitable or adapt OP. Smartphones and social media are the future. There are about a hundred or so people that work on my sales floor. We’re not allowed to have our phones out, if you can’t enforce that rule with 30 kids, maybe you’re not cut out for teaching. I was in high school when cell phones became the norm, my teachers had no problem taking someone’s phone or kicking you out of class if you couldn’t keep it put away.
I’m not crazy about the extent to which technology has taken over our lives, but what can really be done about it? What’s the point of carrying around a bunch of textbooks when you can upload them onto your iPad. Should people just inconvenience themselves so we can keep killing trees, selling books and clinging on to an antiquated standard of how people are supposed to interact with each other?
Just askin. It’s not like smartphones can’t be used for things other than texting your friends and playing games.
Make the kids put their cell phones on their desk turned off. Then plant eyes in the back of your head.
i i,for one, am glad that these brain dead little motherfuckers aren’t going to be allowed to use phones in class, after all, it is sposed to be a place of learning math and such. not yapping and fucking tip tapping the day away. as far as i’m concerned, they should also tae anything that aids kids in anything, except to use their little fucked up on facebook brains. i’m talking of calculaters, and the like.
how the fuck you gonna learn anything, if you can tap a couple of keys, and have the answer in front of you.
where the fuck is your brains. and as to these kids having parking spaces at some schools, there’s another brain dead idea. fuck sakes, what the hell is wrong with walking, busing, or riding a bike to school. all us older folk have done it, and are still alive, and yes, even smart enough to know when and where to use the new technology. and that for sure, isn’t in a fucking classroom.
when i went to dal, if you even had a beeper, you got a major stink eye from the prof. and no wonder, you were sposed to be there to learn.what the fuck is next? i hate to think that tomorrows society, will have a phone implanted in the heads. never know, do you. but we don’t have much to worry about then, because by the time they get out of school, they still won’t know sweet fuck all.
Feed them as many antidepressants as humanly possible, and make them watch constant ‘FAIL’ compilations on Youtube until the end of the day. Get two birds stoned with one rock…
I like zZzeus’s idea, fight technology with technology.
The idea of technology is to make things more efficient, easier. The idea of school is to learn. Taking a concept and breaking it down, understanding it`s base components and how they work together. In math, understanding equations involves recognizing numbers and their values, how they interact with each other i.e. addition, subtraction, multiplication, division to make different numbers and different values then fractions, percentages and so on. The key is to conceptualize from the base level on up. This takes a few years (grades) obviously.
My point is that learning isn`t about doing a task the fastest, easiest way. It`s about the how and why of the task. The reason for the task.
If technology can help with conceptualization then I`m all for it, if it becomes a distraction then not so much.
I`m not against taking these devices to school, this is the age we live in now. However, the classroom should be a vacuum reserved for learning only with the teacher and the topic the focal points.
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION (II): IS THE MEDIUM THE MESSAGE?
“I fear we are creating a new society, bent on instant gratification, no sense of responsibility/respect/manners, and one that has the attention span of a goldfish.” Teacher Afraid For Our Future
In my previous post, “The Trivialization of Education,” in the course of attempting to analyse the impact of “pocket technology” on education, I more or less endorsed the Teacher’s view. I concluded that perhaps, rather than enriching the life of the high school student, such technology might lead to its impoverishment. In the context of a certain view of education – a traditionalist view – this would be true but, in view of the cybernetic revolution, is the traditionalist view of education still viable?
It has been half a century since the explosive publication of Marshall McCluhan’s “Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man” in which his expression, “The medium is the message” became part of the language. McLuhan’s “message” in effect was that it wasn’t what was said – the content of the message – but rather the technology by means of which the message was conveyed – the medium of the message – which was the important thing. In that context it is the “pocket technology” itself – the medium – rather than any particular content which shapes the minds of the high school students. But how will this impact education?
Very significantly. Since the factory school and its assembly line workers – the professional teachers – are the medium of the message, the first step is to get rid of them both, a scenario predicted in Ivan Illich’s “Deschooling Society.” (Someone wanting to learn something would contact a teacher through an Internet listing.) The second step is to get rid of the message itself – the traditionalist view of education in which passive students are instructed in the wisdom of dead white males. The content of education – the message – would be an interactive and collaborative construct developed and refined by those hooked up to that “pocket technology.”
That is why half the class twittered and texted while the Teacher’s guest speaker was holding forth. He was just a talking head from the old and moribund traditionalist education. His time has passed.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
I have no idea what school you’re teaching at OP.. I’ve never been to a school where cell phones were allowed. If you were caught with it, the teachers were allowed to take them away and you had to get a parent to come in and get it if you wanted it back. My friend’s phone was even taken away from her while she was out in the hallway crying because one of our friends was missing and she was talking to someone who was out looking for her. I just find it hard to believe that schools would now make phones okay. It wasn’t that long ago when I was in school! Like 4 years ago!
Dartmouthy, you know I love you hon, but I’ve got a couple of questions—
why does your son need to talk to you while he is at school?
have you considered the broader implications of allowing your son to skirt school rules?
To parents who say they need their child to have a cell phone in case of a home emergency, I reply “the last thing you want to do is call your kid at school to say the house is on fire. The much better option is to call the school, where professionals can take him out of class, arrange for transportation, coordinate with other schools if there are siblings and so on.”
Kids spend so much of their day figuring out how to hide the damn phones from the teacher that they can’t focus on the lesson. Yes, it is a pet peeve of mine.
you’re a good teacher though, not always the case in our public school system. i’m looking at you useless feckless school board
The future is bleak.
A teacher should have all rights to take a cell phone away from a student who is not paying attention. It’s not a learning tool nor is it a right to have one. And high school kids are idiots. A high school kid demanding respect from The One They Call Biscuit will result in a buttery slap to the chops. And it won’t be all soft and fluffy like a pair of Hush Puppies.
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION (III): THINKING OUT LOUD
In my last post I conducted a “thought experiment” in respect to Marshall McCluhan’s mantra “The medium is the message” and its relevance, if any, to present-day education. My treatment was exploratory rather than critical, an attempt to see where the mantra led and what impact it would have on current educational practice. While the latter was significant – the elimination of the “factory schools” and their teachers (those assembly line workers) which would be replaced by a student-driven “interactive and collaborative construct developed and refined by those hooked up to that pocket technology” – no attempt was made to engage the former, the theoretical basis by which that impact gained traction. In other words, what does the mantra mean? Maybe it’s time to do a little thinking out loud.
For McCluhan the “message,” the content of any communication, had no independent meaning apart from the “medium,” the technology by which that message was conveyed. In the present case that medium is the “pocket technology” referred to in the bitch. McCluhan would not have included cell-phones in his concept of cyberetic techology since they did not possess those “deep structures,” that tranformative quality which re-wires the consciousness of their users. (Cell-phones in the class? Kick ’em out! I’m not talking about cell-phones.)
The difficulty with the mantra, however, kicks in at the level of the “message” as it relates to the student. What is its content? Having been collapsed into the medium which, by definition, can accomodate any content whatsoever, how can the message be said to have any content at all? What, in other words, will the student whose consciousness has been re-wired by the cybernetic technology think about? If the traditional curriculum consisting of those “modes of thought and awareness” (cf. Paul Hirst) into which the student is to be initiated in the process of becoming enculturated (cf. R.S. Peters) are to be jettisoned, what is our student – in possession of that heightened state of cybernetic awareness – to do with himself?
Of course, we must remember that in order to get his ideas about the transformative powers of cybenetic technology across, Marshall McCluhan wrote an old-style traditional book.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpIYz8tfGjY
classic stuff, thanks commander
Thanks Xeno 🙂 Right back at ya.
My son is a latch-key kid – so he has a cellphone so he can text me or call me when he gets out of school, and when he gets to my parents house after school, so I know he is ok. If he forgot his key or something happens, he can contact me, and I feel better knowing he has that option.
He doesn’t bring his cell phone into the classroom – it stays in his book bag while he is in class. So he isn’t skirting school rules by bringing it into class.
But. I do have a problem with him not being allowed to communicate with me when there is no learning (my son’s or other childrens’) that is being affected.
Like at lunch time.
To me that is totally unreasonable. Why shouldn’t my son be able to call me at lunch if he wants to?
Who is his teacher or principal or school board to tell a child’s parent, or a child, they can’t communicate with each other at lunch time? lol.
It’s totally ludicrous. The only explanation in my mind is this rules at all costs mindset that teachers, administrators and boards have to rely on. Control freaks! And it’s not helping them.
My son will just most likely resent their opinions from now on, as will I, because they are obviously totally unreasonable. They are not there to enable his education, really – my son will be lucky to come across one or two teachers during his whole public school existence that will give a fuck about him as a human and as an individual.
Otherwise he is getting a good lesson on unions, socialism, and what they have done to the educational system, lol.
It gets my back up basically, that his school will take such liberties with my right to communicate with my son.
If there is no learning being impacted, why are they so interested in controlling my son?
In my mind it dovetails nicely with the new regulations the NDP have set out in respect to daycares – which is why my son is a latchkey kid now. I don’t want the government telling me what I am allowed to feed me child – and I’ll be damned if they are telling me I can’t talk to him either! Government approved apple? Government approved communications device? Fuck that!
RSVP
: Col. Ivan Sonofabitch (April 1, 10:46AM)
Excellent clip, Ivan. As they used to say on Laugh-In, “Marshall McLuhan, what are you doin’?”
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to meet my class in Communications Studies at Columbia.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
You bet your bippy, Dennis. >: )
This is why youth are unable to do basic math today.
Thanks, Ivan, and look at the bright side: at least we don’t have spittle on our necks!
Dartmouthy-I hear you, BUT…I worry about a kid who can’t go 6 hours without calling his da…He’s still a little guy, right? Are you planning on weaning him off as he ages?
Remember when you couldn’t chew gum or wear a hat, and teachers could actually give a failing grade without giving a flying shit about your feelings? It’s about time we went back to the old way, where children weren’t the boss!!!
That’s exactly it Xeno, I wouldn’t expect him too at all, and it wouldn’t be every day lol… but when it strikes him he’d like to video chat with me on google talk, or if I want to call him and see how his day is going, it’s nice to think children would be innocent until proven guilty when it comes to their maturity level and responsibility level. Unless it is disrupting educational opportunities, why should it matter? At all? My son isn’t cyberbullying… he isn’t using it in class. So shouldn’t he be allowed to use it otherwise?
They took it away from him on a recent school trip to Martock for example. So instead of him being able to listen to some tunes on the bus (which is what I did with my walkman back in the 80s on school trips) his phone is confiscated for his “safety”… What the hell?
Not everything is up to the school to meter out and determine for parents, except when it comes to learning opportunities, which I totally support. No phones in the classroom I get it, what about tablets? It’s only a matter of time!
that was a classic bitch that you posted d’mouth, what with the poor lad having to eat in the bathroom. i feel your rage but he will be fine just like the boy
dartmouthy… I hadn’t realized they disconnected all the phones from the office…
they aren’t dictating whether you can speak with your son at all….
they’re limiting HOW you do so in order to prevent distractions to other students.
they make the rules based on the lowest common denominator.
They have to… otherwise you’d have to allow rules for certain kids because they ‘are good kids’ or ‘know better’ and then lock down on the bad kids… and they all cry unfair and discriminatory.
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION (IV): THE PEDAGOGICAL RELATION
: Dartmouthy (April 1, 1:53PM)
“It’s totally ludicrous. The only explanation in my mind is this rules at all costs mindset that teachers, administrators and boards have to rely on. Control freaks! And it’s not helping them.”
: Stephen Harper (7:41PM)
“It’s about time we went back to the old way, when children weren’t the boss!!!”
What is the proper relation between teacher and student? Is there any such proper pedagogical relation at all or is it an open, fluid and ultimately amorphous concept? While one’s answer to that question will vary according to the maturity level of the student – high school as opposed to elementary, more or less – and the discursive dimension of the subject being taught – the humanities, for example, as opposed to the sciences – this does not mean that the question is unanswerable. Restricting the discussion to the high-school humanities, it all comes down to the the philosophy of education of the teacher himself.
The first point to be made is that the teacher, whether he realizes it or not, does have a philosophy of education. In other words, simply being a teacher entails having some conception of what education is all about and, by extension, the nature of the pedagogical relation. So, what is education all about?
Unless one (mistakenly) reduces education to some sort of skill acquisition, to some sort of training, it seems unavoidable to understand education as the cultivation of the mind by way of enculturation into the ways of thinking and awareness constitutive of that encultured mind. So there are two compents in the educational process, those of the culture and the mind of the student. The pedagogical relation will depend on which component the emphasis is to be placed. Ideally, there should be a balance between the two.
Let’s take History as an example. One school of thought – call it the Gradgrind School of the teaching of History – sees it as a compilation of past “facts” which the student must absorb, a view with obvious implications for the pedagogical relation. Another school of thought – call it the Interpretive School – sees such past “facts” not as the end of the learning of History but rather as the begining of the student’s quest to understand their significance, their meaning. This view, the one I favour, also has obvious implications for the pedagogical relation.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Y’Ok, Dartmouthy, I do see your point…and although I don’t know the specifics of your boy’s school admins. I’ll try to explain it from the other side.
While your boy is using his celly to communicate with you or Nana and Papa, other kids in the class do not have such pure motives. They are using their phones to cyberbully and cheat. (and that age group, I’m sorry to say, is the cruelest) Now, what is the teacher or administrator to do? Say-OK, you good kids may use your phones, but not the bad kids (hard to do since a very small % of kids get caught) OR say “OK, nobody gets to use a phone”
Thing is, Dartmouthy, the three R’s are only part of why kids are in school. The other part is to teach them to be good citizens and (frankly) how to do things when they don’t feel like it. (like, say, get out of bed and go to work.)
I was mentoring a first year teacher who took his students to a local pond for research. One of his kids lights a cigarette. When the teacher told him he can’t smoke, the kid starts to argue that he is not on school grounds so it’s OK. When the teacher says no, the kid whips out his celly (also not allowed) CALLS HIS FATHER and hands the teacher the phone where the father starts to argue with the teacher, saying I gave my kid permission to smoke-who the hell are you to say he can’t?
Now you could say that as the class was walking to the pond, no learning time was impacted, but that was not my take away. This happened a few years ago, and the kid dropped out of school and has had a series of minimum wage jobs since. He can’t keep the jobs because he keeps arguing with his bosses, thinking he knows best.
I know you love your son deeply, and as a single parent want to be ever there for him, but I’m just asking you to see the other side of the coin. Same with the snacks at daycare. Some kids get hyper with sugar or chocolate…should the teacher divide the class, or just say no candy for anyone?
(BTW, I was interested in buying the bungalow I lived in last summer, but the list price is almost double the assessed value. Are house prices going through the roof in Dartmouth, or what?)
just people being greedy per usual.
in this case, likely both the current owner AND the gubment raising taxes.
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION (V): TEACHING HISTORY
In my last post (April 2, 10:27AM) I spoke of the “Interpretive School” of teaching History, one in which mere acquisition historical “facts” (the Gradgrind School) was not the end but only the beginning of the student’s quest “to understand their significance, their meaning.” But what did THAT mean? The answer lies in discovering the meaning of the historical “fact” itself and, by extension the meaning of History and, by further extension, the pedagogy involved in teaching History. So, what is the historical “fact”?
Note the word “fact” is in quotation marks. This is because it is not a fact at all in the same way that the law of gravity, for example, is a scientific fact. It was a fact that the apple, obeying the law of gravity, fell on Newton’s head but to see the historical “fact” like this is to confound it with the historical EVENT which is gone forever. The law of gravity still operates but you will not be hit by a stray musket ball when reading about the War of 1812. For the historical “fact” is the historian’s statement about the event, his judgement about its significance. In other words, it is his interpretation of the event.
The study of History therefore, like its teaching, is also an exercise in interpretation for which no hard-and-fast rules apply. (Do not confuse a chronology – a bare listing of the events – with a history of the event.) It is based on the assessment of evidence but such assessment ultimately relies on the judgement of the student in dialogue with that of the teacher. That is why it History is one of the Humanities. Perhaps the most important one.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
That’s true Zed, but what if his kid need to contact HIM? Usually that’s the real emergency.
I can see both sides of Xeno and Mouthy’s arguments. I do think that a kid should be innocent until proven guilty, isn’t that worth instilling in them at a young age? You treat a kid like a criminal all the time from a young age he is likely to end up one, or end up with a big chip on his shoulder.
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION (V): TEACHING HISTORY
Typos: 3rd. paragraph, line 2: “chronicle” for “chronology;” 3rd. paragraph, last line: omit “it.”
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
I’m a local Journalism student, and I’d like to do a story on this issue. It’d be for a class assignment, with a quick turn around date. Would you be interested in doing an interview? If you’d rather not give your name, you wouldn’t have to.
THE TRIVIALIZATION OF EDUCATION (V): TEACHING HISTORY
After the corrections of my typos well, eveything’s perfect.
Want to debate? No, I didn’t think so.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Well, you are a master debater…
and why can’t the kid go to the office to call his parents?