Juno News - Does Ontario’s cell phone ban in classrooms go far enough？

00:00:00.000 I wanted to turn to an issue that is near and dear to a lot of those of you watching and

00:00:13.900 listening to this and that is what your child is learning in the classroom and more importantly

00:00:18.560 how effectively they are learning. Now I had it easy because I think like there were no hand there

00:00:24.360 the only handheld device that I had to contend with when I was of school age was I think a Tamagotchi

00:00:31.060 which at one point was like beeping up a storm in the classroom so the teacher just took it and put

00:00:36.860 it in her desk and I don't even think I ever saw it again to be honest so that Tamagotchi is probably

00:00:41.440 long since died by now or maybe it's just you know living up the life in my teacher's retirement but

00:00:47.280 now kids have everything they have like their iPhones their iPads their all of these different

00:00:52.600 I'm just going to name other devices and then I realized I don't know any more devices now because

00:00:55.980 iPods aren't a thing I think they've just been replaced by the iPhone basically but

00:01:00.340 the Ontario government has tried to do something about this they've come up with a policy that

00:01:05.040 effectively keeps devices out of the classroom up to a certain point and then says from grade

00:01:10.480 seven and up I think it is that with teacher permission they can be used. Some people are

00:01:15.780 welcoming this but others are saying it does not go far enough. Joining me is Paige McPherson the

00:01:22.120 Associate Director of Education Policy for the Fraser Institute. Paige always good to talk to you

00:01:27.520 thanks for coming on today. My pleasure thanks for having me. So let's talk first off about the why

00:01:34.740 here because I think there are some people that just take a an anti-distraction and anti-tech view

00:01:39.720 and they don't want kids on their phones in class but the data actually support this as being a fairly

00:01:44.920 significant thing when it comes to educational achievement and performance doesn't it?

00:01:48.580 Yeah absolutely so we have really interesting and valuable PISA data so that's the program for

00:01:54.920 international student assessment from the OECD that that looks we probably most people know that

00:02:00.740 as the sort of gold standard international test of 15 year olds that is done so PISA has great student

00:02:06.780 performance data in math reading and science but they also have an insights report that has data on

00:02:13.500 a whole bunch of different things and they looked at smartphones and digital distractions in

00:02:17.240 classrooms in their most recent report and what it found is that there's actually a measurable impact

00:02:23.460 on math scores in particular when it comes to digital distraction in classrooms so that's from people

00:02:30.740 either being distracted by their own devices or people being distracted by the devices of people in

00:02:36.740 the classroom around them and that's really informative for when it comes to crafting smartphone ban policies

00:02:43.520 in classrooms because it means that it's not just what one student has on their own desk that matters

00:02:50.740 to have an actual measurable impact on their math scores and other research has shown really their cognitive

00:02:57.220 development or that they're actually cognitively impairing to have this digital distraction going on

00:03:03.080 but it actually matters what other students in the classroom have as well now I don't know at what age kids

00:03:10.300 are getting phones I'm assuming there's a bit of a range here but the policy really I think where it's relevant

00:03:16.700 is from the 7 to 12 so great grade 7 to 12 not age and that's where the teacher can say okay if maybe

00:03:23.520 you'll you want to have your phone that's fine or the teacher could say no I feel bad for teachers here because now all of a sudden

00:03:30.300 they're the bad guys and they're the ones that have to enforce this and if you've got some 16 year old

00:03:35.700 boy or girl that doesn't want to put their phone down even if the teacher has said no that's really

00:03:41.140 the end of it here so the enforcement I think will be a huge problem here and it's again another thing

00:03:45.860 teachers have to deal with I totally agree with you I think this is one of the flaws in the the policy

00:03:52.020 that Doug Ford's government has put forward that you pointed out is that there's a much more uniform strict

00:03:57.620 ban in the younger grades and where yeah we do know that kids are starting to get smartphones in

00:04:03.720 grade 3 4 5 which might come as a shock to some parents my oldest kid is 6 and I can't believe that

00:04:11.420 this is a reality it's almost around the corner but this is this is true but the likelihood of that

00:04:17.240 kid bringing their smartphone to school and being distracted by it during the day it exists but it's

00:04:22.740 it's a lot lower whereas we know that the stats on on smartphone ownership in high school are through

00:04:29.940 the roof almost all teenagers have these devices and they're the ones who are much more likely to be

00:04:35.400 glued to their devices throughout the day so having a policy that is the most uniform as possible and

00:04:41.240 really as strict as possible when it comes to just removing the digital distraction from teenagers

00:04:46.760 teachers in particular and and middle schoolers as well where there's middle schools in Ontario that is

00:04:52.760 something that you know I think that's a big flaw in the policy and the other thing as well is that so the

00:04:58.040 2019 smartphone so-called ban which wasn't really a ban that the Ontario government had in place left it up to

00:05:05.320 school boards this new policy which I still will not call a ban is it leaves it up to teachers discretion which as you say

00:05:14.760 makes teachers the bad guys teachers need to know that yeah they can be the bad guy sometime and

00:05:21.080 discipline in classrooms is really important and teachers maintaining you know calm control over

00:05:26.840 their classroom we know from the research this is a really important thing for for great student

00:05:32.920 outcomes but teachers also need to know that they're supported by their administration principals school

00:05:38.680 boards and the provincial government so that they can say to kids look this is the policy it is what it is

00:05:44.920 with very few exceptions like for example kids that need to check um for medical reasons if they're

00:05:50.200 monitoring their blood sugar they need their cell phone to um uh to to help in that okay there's

00:05:55.560 going to be some exceptions but as uniform and blanket as the ban can be so that it takes teach it takes

00:06:00.680 it out of teachers hands stops teachers from surveilling and nagging throughout the day I think the better

00:06:05.400 the policy will look one thing I wanted to ask about and this is when we talk about school as a

00:06:11.320 a preparatory influence for the real world is that the real world is one in which people are surrounded

00:06:16.600 by phones and phones are a part of everyday life in the same way that I think the you know the

00:06:21.640 the negativity surrounding calculators has sort of gone away because most of us in life and again

00:06:27.480 probably wrongfully so but most of us in life will never need to you know memorize our multiplication

00:06:31.720 tables or whatever but is there not something to the argument that we should be using technology

00:06:38.360 as an educational tool in the classroom because that's the the counter I've heard to this is that

00:06:44.040 well no no it's not realistic to you know have this technologically sterile environment so let's

00:06:49.400 just make sure that we're leveraging this and using the advantages of these devices for learning

00:06:53.560 that is what definitely one of the most prominent counter arguments what I would say to that is

00:07:00.120 that school is for two things school is for preparing students for the world in terms of their

00:07:07.160 their learning and their academic achievement students need to go to school to learn we know

00:07:13.000 that once a student is distracted by a smartphone it can take one research study showed 20 minutes to

00:07:19.720 regain focus a full 20 minutes that's an entire lesson in some cases just that one just just to

00:07:27.000 just to drill into that point so if I you know look at my phone for a second and look away

00:07:32.360 I would assume that the distraction has now ended that I'm I'm back but you're saying with kids that's

00:07:37.000 actually not the case at all kids don't have the same amount of brain development that has happened

00:07:41.240 that adults have they don't have the same um prefrontal cortex development that controls impulse

00:07:47.400 um so they they don't they aren't able you know if you feel your phone buzzing in your pocket you

00:07:52.360 might say you know what I'm going to get to that later because I'm working on something and we know

00:07:56.760 as adults it's really difficult for us as well but for kids it's so much more difficult because they

00:08:01.560 just don't have that impulse control they don't have that same level of brain development that we have

00:08:06.360 as adults which makes smartphones in general really problematic for a lot of kids and teenagers but

00:08:12.440 certainly when it comes to focus there are big uh impacts and there's been a lot of work

00:08:18.040 and research in psychology that has been done on this exact topic a Jonathan Heights book is a really

00:08:23.160 great resource on this he's a psychologist that has written about this recently he calls for a ban

00:08:28.280 of smartphones in schools say it says that they should be put into a lockable pouch or a locker for

00:08:34.120 the school day the reason being that kids just don't have that level of impulse control but the other

00:08:38.920 thing that I would add is that school yes for learning that's the primary purpose of school

00:08:44.520 it's not just to prepare kids for the modern world or whatever the sort of rhetoric around that will

00:08:49.400 be um it's also for genuine socialization right it's it's for kids to be able to um do things face

00:08:57.080 to face to interact with their teachers interact with their peers face to face when you put away

00:09:01.720 the digital devices that are in front of kids faces and distracting them throughout the day you're

00:09:07.160 going to have more of that genuine face to face socialization which I also think is quite important

00:09:11.960 for kids um in many many real world contexts socially but also professionally yeah it's funny

00:09:18.280 you mention that because I've seen some people argue and I I'm again I'm I've got a bigger issue with

00:09:23.480 this but I I certainly understand the argument of banning them at all points in the school day so

00:09:29.640 even in the lunchroom you shouldn't be able to have your phone out and and that's really one of the

00:09:33.480 reasons when you talk about socialization there is that the whole point is that you have a time in

00:09:37.960 your life in which you're all in the same room you can all get together you can all talk and have fun

00:09:42.040 and laugh and I suspect if you walk into most lunch rooms now that everyone is just glued to their

00:09:46.920 phones absolutely so if you ask my personal opinion on it I think that phones should be banned

00:09:52.200 throughout the day most of the experts who are on out there on this topic agree that the ban should

00:09:57.640 be throughout the day for those socialization aspects but also because we know that phones and

00:10:03.640 some of the PISA data actually speaks to this as well the eight and ten kids in Canada say that they're

00:10:09.720 they're anxious when their smartphone is not with them at all times in the day we need to break that

00:10:14.680 cycle that's actually higher than the OECD average which is closer to 60 percent of kids we also know

00:10:19.640 from that data again that kids are distracted by their own devices yes but they're also distracted by

00:10:24.440 others devices as well so if kids are thinking about the next moment that they're going to get

00:10:29.960 to their smartphone thinking about the next moment that the person beside them is going to get to

00:10:34.760 their smartphone if you know kids on in schools are they're taking videos of one another they're

00:10:40.120 showing each other um things on their phones if you think okay my kid has pretty good self-discipline

00:10:45.960 um that's one thing but they're the the ability for them to be distracted by other kids

00:10:51.880 is really significant as well and parents play a role in this too right parents a lot of parents

00:10:57.800 want to be able to get in touch with their kids at all times during the day and this is a situation

00:11:03.000 wherein um i do think provincial governments need to show leadership i i believe that parental

00:11:07.960 involvement in schools um you know providing consent um being informed if they want to be about what

00:11:15.080 their kids are learning in school offering feedback on that there's good research to show that

00:11:19.720 that that's really important for for beneficial um student outcomes student achievement being

00:11:24.760 stronger as well um but parents will need to get on board with a policy um that they know that if

00:11:30.920 there is a true emergency they can call the office and not get in touch with their kids throughout the

00:11:35.800 day so there are there are stumbling blocks beyond just you know that one child and their smartphone and

00:11:41.880 how much they're using it throughout the day there's a digital distraction that is so much larger than that

00:11:46.920 um in classrooms if we allow the sort of okay well you can have your smartphone now you can you you can

00:11:53.160 um get it back and then you give it back and then you know this this throughout the day um there's

00:11:57.880 logistics that have to be worked out when you think about things like lockable pouches some of your

00:12:02.840 viewers might have gone to a concert or a comedy show where they had to put them in a lockable pouch

00:12:08.360 um because the the show was being recorded for a streaming service they probably enjoyed the show a lot

00:12:13.240 more because they didn't have distractions and then they got their phone back from that lockable

00:12:17.320 pouch from security at the end of the concert teachers can employ that um or schools and you

00:12:22.120 can do that with lock cell phone lockers as well it does become a little bit logistically tricky when

00:12:27.240 you think about high school students moving from class to class but independent schools across

00:12:32.360 north america um you know there are examples of schools that have done this with quite large student

00:12:36.760 populations it's very doable um and i think the benefits of having focus from kids during classroom

00:12:42.680 time at so far outweigh the costs when you and i are the same age and i recall maybe on two or three

00:12:52.280 occasions in the entirety that i went to school where something was so urgent that my mother needed to

00:12:57.720 call the school and have the you know the office page the classroom and have the teacher send me to

00:13:03.160 the like it's not that common in most cases that you're going to need that but there was a process

00:13:08.360 available and you know maybe it took you know four minutes longer than you know just texting me would

00:13:13.560 have but i i also wonder how much and you may have i know it gets outside of the the educational

00:13:18.600 policy realm but as a parent you might have thoughts on this the idea that parents might be

00:13:23.880 more of the problem than kids in some of these cases that you know parents are the ones that

00:13:28.360 are are in that emergency mindset i mean the kids may want their phones for other reason but that

00:13:32.520 that emergency need for contact argument i just don't think is really as real as some parents

00:13:38.520 might make it out to be yeah there is you know it's sort of a byproduct of our modern world um

00:13:44.680 this sort of safetyism culture that we need to be able to monitor kids 24 7. um it is certainly

00:13:50.600 prevalent um and i do think that you know when it comes to policies like this you do need to have

00:13:55.720 people you know the policies need to be thoroughly explained to parents they are a critically

00:14:00.760 important stakeholder in education but ultimately schools ban certain things that we know are

00:14:07.480 negative for kids there are going to be some like i said exceptions for medical reasons and whatnot

00:14:13.560 um but but this is not something that school is for right school is not to be distracted by their

00:14:20.200 smartphones all day and if parents can sort of come to understand that the um improved cognitive

00:14:27.640 abilities of their kids during the school day um the reduced anxiety the increased genuine

00:14:34.520 socialization the increased ability for teachers to maintain excuse me maintain control over their

00:14:40.440 classrooms reduce the nagging reduce the surveilling that they're having to spend so much classroom time

00:14:46.440 on we know that parents are in many cases dissatisfied with falling student performance results as well

00:14:54.520 these are important um outcomes for kids to ensure that they have bright futures and to ensure brighter

00:14:59.880 futures for our provinces so ultimately knowing that smartphones in classrooms distracting kids

00:15:05.960 are a significant component of this problem um and knowing as well that you know we've got big

00:15:11.480 fish to fry when it comes to education policy um but this is one that is pretty easily solvable

00:15:17.480 with a simple elegant not very expensive policy solution that we already have at our fingertips

00:15:24.120 we just need courage from provincial governments to implement this policy so yes parents are going

00:15:28.920 to need to come on board we have to push back against that safetyism culture just a little bit when

00:15:33.720 it comes to this but knowing that um that parents can get in touch with them with their students if needed

00:15:40.600 perhaps keeping in mind that a consistent engagement between schools and parents so parents can feel

00:15:46.840 very involved in that process that's an important component of education too um but but everybody

00:15:51.880 kind of acknowledging that this is an issue that we can very easily solve because all of our kids

00:15:56.120 deserve um an environment in their classrooms that is free of digital distraction no very well said

00:16:01.880 and it was part of the fun too the the announcement comes and calls someone to the office everyone else

00:16:06.280 in the classroom gets to go it's part of the fun why rob your children of that uh you know potential

00:16:12.440 public shaming or whatever anyway all right page mcpherson always good to talk to you thanks for

00:16:16.600 coming on today yeah i like that you've highlighted that we live in the we lived in the golden era of

00:16:21.240 tamagotchis and public shaming over the announcement yes uh yeah i buy tamagotchi i think i lived like 14

00:16:27.800 days it was like my first experience at uh loss and heartbreak i think but anyway set me up well for the future

00:16:34.120 thanks for listening to the andrew lawton show support the program by donating to true north at www.tnc.news

Juno News - May 20, 2024

Does Ontario’s cell phone ban in classrooms go far enough？

Episode Stats

Length

Words per Minute

Word Count

Sentence Count

Summary

Transcript