OPINION || There is increasing research into the problems caused by the excessive use of smartphones and the disadvantages of having them in the classroom, writes Jill Filipovic
Hey, parents, leave your kids alone.
This is increasingly the message from educators, therapists, child development experts, and even professors and college administrators, who argue that overinvolved parents are too technologically connected to their children and, as a result, are harming their children’s potential. of their children and not being able to launch independent adults into the world.
Jill Filipovic (pictured) is a New York-based journalist and author of “OK Boomer, Let’s Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind.” The opinions expressed in this comment are hers alone. Courtesy of Jill Filipovic
In schools, children are clinging to their cell phones to the detriment of their attention and education – but some students and their parents argue that they need to be constantly available for parental contact. Teachers report that parents argue with them about grades, call their children during class, expect constant updates via text messages, and even monitor their children’s screens or listen to lessons when their children are in the classroom.
Of course, most parents want the best for their children. But what seems best for calming immediate anxieties isn’t necessarily what’s best for a child’s development and well-being.
According to research firm Pew, 95% of North American teenagers have access to a smartphone. And teens have access to a smartphone at surprisingly young ages, with 91% of 13 and 14 year olds saying they have access.
There is more and more research into the many, many problems caused by excessive smartphone use among young people and adults – and the many, many disadvantages of having smartphones in the classroom. Cell phones can affect our cognition, increase our anxiety and decrease our attention span. Cell phones are a distraction and when students have them in the classroom, those students are distracted – a study carried out by UNESCO in 14 countries concluded that a student takes, on average, 20 minutes to concentrate after receiving a text message. text. Many adults who have smartphones can probably understand how difficult it is to ignore the “ping” of a text message or the flashing of an alert, and we are people with fully developed brains and much more sophisticated capabilities for delaying gratification and making rational decisions.
Smartphones and the apps they contain were designed by some of the smartest people in the world to capture, hold and re-capture our attention. Of course, this works with children too, perhaps even more effectively than with adults. And, of course, when a child’s attention is on their phone, it’s not on the teacher or classroom materials.
Nor is this attention directed to other children. Since smartphones became ubiquitous in the United States, in-person socializing has plummeted. This may not be solely attributable to smartphone use, but many experts point to screens as one of the main reasons why young people (and many other Americans) have fewer friends and spend much less time together than they used to. And it’s not because teenagers are being overwhelmed with homework or after-school activities; hours spent on homework decreased, while hours spent on extracurricular activities remained stable, psychology professor Jean Twenge told The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson. According to a report from the Aspen Institute, fewer teenagers are playing sports. “Today’s teenagers have more leisure time than they used to,” Twenge said. “They just choose to show it on their cell phones.”
Many parents say that screen time and what their children do on their phones are a concern, and affluent parents appear to be increasingly removing their children from screens at home and in the classroom (it seems particularly telling that many Silicon parents Valley people who work in technology strive to prevent their own children from using it). But the daily need to communicate regularly with children seems, for many parents, to override what we know or should know intellectually about using a cell phone.
And it seems that the driving force behind what so many teachers are identifying is not the addictive technology itself, but rather the anxieties enabled and perhaps heightened by these technologies. There is the obvious threat in the US of school shootings, which is certainly one of the reasons why parents may want their children to have cell phones with them. There appears to be a widespread feeling that children may be being left behind, and in a highly unequal society, the risks to education appear extremely high. It’s understandable that parents want to make sure their children are not just learning, but that they are performing well and succeeding.
But there also seems to be a more general desire to be intimately involved in children’s lives – and a feeling that they may be missing out on something important if they don’t. And, of course, the more parents act this way, the more others may feel neglectful or unconcerned if they don’t get as involved.
But surveillance and micromanagement of children, including in the classroom, may be sending a message to children that they are not capable of being independent people and are not capable of managing their own education, conflicts and challenges. Part of a parent’s job is to equip their children to go out into the world as independent, self-sufficient adults, and doing so requires letting them experience hardship, pain, failure, and disagreement. Parents can and should provide support and love, but they should not be willing to solve all problems. Children who don’t develop these skills when they’re at home can have a much harder time when they leave (perhaps this is why teachers and university administrators also report similar problems with over-involved parents).
Several parents told me that they also make an effort to stay connected to their children in emergency situations, minimizing distractions at school. Michael Smith, a Brooklyn father of three, wrote in an email that although his oldest has a cell phone and his two youngest have Apple watches that they could use to call in case of an emergency, “their watches are locked in time. school’ and my older brother and I are the only people they can call/text,” he wrote.
Some parents also mentioned that cell phones can be useful for children with special needs. Kathleen Moran, who raised her adult children in Virginia Beach, said the phone was a lifesaver for her oldest son, who has autism. It meant that when the bus driver left him in the wrong place or a scheduled pickup didn’t arrive, he could call for help. And people with disabilities face high rates of abuse, including sometimes from caregivers and educators. “I have never felt completely comfortable with my children, especially my son with autism, being cared for by school staff and we have always had to have a system for that,” Moran wrote in an email. But, she added, “I didn’t specifically tell him to use the phone to call me, because I knew that would get him in trouble.”
Beatrice Robbins, a Brooklyn mother of a seven-year-old second grader, said her son has been asking for a phone since kindergarten, when some of his classmates started having them. She told him he could have one when he was 10 years old—a year quickly approaching. “I will probably keep the phone at home during 5th grade, but depending on school policies, I may let it use it from high school onwards,” she wrote in an email, especially since he will be taking public transport to school. school and will have to use the map and text mom if the train is late. “I don’t want him to have a cell phone in class because he has no medical need and I know he won’t resist playing with it,” she wrote. “But… we’re in the US. I want him to have a phone with him so he can call for help or send me a text message if an angry, off-medication psychopath walks into the school and starts shooting at everyone. It’s impossible think about it, but it’s also impossible not to think about it.”
In other words, many parents seem to want a reasonable balance: Children who are not distracted in class, but who have their cell phones in case of emergencies. Part of a society’s job is to create institutions, and especially schools, that prioritize children’s learning, without addressing parents’ anxieties and desires above all else. Some schools are banning cell phones; others are requiring that these cell phones be placed in a bag during the school day, which can be opened in case of emergency, which seems like a very good idea and an appropriate way to alleviate parents’ concerns.
Social media platforms must do their part by restricting children’s access to their platforms. And school directors have to impose themselves, even when faced with anxious or demanding parents. There must be solid education, from the earliest years of schooling, on why parents should not buy smartphones for their teenagers or young adults – the fewer young people who have smartphones, the less pressure there will be on children and their parents to acquire. And there should simply be rules about not using cell phones in class, even if it makes parents upset or interrupts their ability to get a text response at any time of the day.
However, much of this has to do with the decisions each of us makes individually. Many of us, I suspect, know that we should be spending less time glued to screens. And many parents, I suspect, may be acting with good intentions and genuinely wanting to raise independent, self-sufficient adults, but have difficulty letting go of their most precious people on a daily basis. However, just as young people are learning to be students and people in the world, parents must also learn to overcome their own fears and give their children more autonomy.
