France Bans Smartphones in School (washingtonpost.com) 161
When French students return to school in September they'll have to leave one of their most prized possessions at home -- their smartphone. From a report: French lawmakers on Monday passed legislation banning students as old as 15 from bringing smartphones and tablets to school or having them turned off at least, according to the Agence France-Presse. Officials in support of the new rule described the policy as a way to shield children from addictive habits and to safeguard the sanctity of the classroom. "We know today that there is a phenomenon of screen addiction, the phenomenon of bad mobile phone use," education minister Jean-Michel Blanquer told French news channel BFMTV, according to CNN. "Our main role is to protect children and adolescents. It is a fundamental role of education, and this law allows it." The law, however, does make exceptions for educational use, extra-curricular actives and for students with disabilities, the AFP reports. French high schools can choose to impose a less stringent ban on Internet-connected devices.
safeguard the sanctity of the classroom? (Score:1)
Have these people set a foot in a school recently?
Re: safeguard the sanctity of the classroom? (Score:5, Insightful)
You may be confused, this is France, not America, where the public schools are a mix of shooting gallery, drug den, drone factory and whorehouse, and the private schools are filled with religious indoctrination to make the next generation of arrows for Jesus.
Re: safeguard the sanctity of the classroom? (Score:4, Insightful)
The biggest threat of death facing students is car accidents. That's followed by suicide - usually from bullying. That's over 100x as common as death from school shootings. France's suicide statistics are similar to the U.S., so it's not unreasonable to think their student suicide rate is similar. And smartphones and social media are one of the primary methods now used by students to bully each other.
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And smartphones and social media are one of the primary methods now used by students to bully each other.
Cellphones don't bully. People do.
It's not that we want to ban phones. They are useful tools, a heck of a lot of fun, and can save you in an emergency.
Along with the benefits, we should recognise the harm done by phones. Sure, they are far from the biggest killer, but somehow our country seems to have a unique problem with them, at least among civilised nations. Thousands of deaths are not to be ignored just because it is less deadly than cancer or road transport.
So how can we continue to g
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A student is more likely to be killed by a deer [slashdot.org] than by a school shooting at a U.S. school
Bad maths. How many deer are there at US schools?
Can I choose to go to a school that doesn't have deer thereby eliminating this risk altogether?
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A student is more likely to be killed by a deer
A completely stupid comparison given the risk of death by deer is avoidable and entirely in control of the person being (not) killed. Unless you're suggesting that kids in classrooms get randomly visited by savage deers leaving a bloodbath in its wake.
Don't abuse statistics. There is a big difference between dying due to your action, and dying randomly while doing a mandatory societal activity due to cultural stupidity.
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I note that it was 120 Americans killed by deer IN ALL AGE GROUPS. In 2015, 425 Americans in all age groups were killed in mass shootings, over 13,000 died by gunshot wound (I'll admit this figure includes accidents).
Oh, but you wanted us to ignore the person who pointed this out... because it invalidates your theory.
Thus far this year, 40 people have been killed in school shootings. We're not talking about freak accidents involving an elk on the road here (which is
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helicopter parents would howl in outrage as they wouldn't be able to nag/stalk their kid on a minute by minute basis.
how on earth did the human race ever survive without constant telemetry of our kids?
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I didn't get my first cell phone until I was in my 20s and it wasn't even close to a smart phone. My parents still somehow knew when I was out getting into trouble and I have never relied on a cell phone to let me keep track of my kids as a matter of fact they didn't get a smart phone until they paid for it themselves.
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Yes where you make the collect call and instead of recording your name it's a rushed "I'm at... Come pick me up"
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laptops.
desktops.
GUI robots.
The "internet".
The USA put so much money into every school and per student. The test results stayed the same for decades in the USA. With all the new support and more tax spending.
More tax to pay for more support for education did not result in smarter students from the 1980's and beyond.
France tried that with its MO5, T07 computers.
Remove the distractions and focus on merit. Pass exams and see what education in Fra
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Exactly. If your kid is doing homework in front of the TV and not getting much done, what do you do? You turn off the TV.
Removing distractions and devices which are, at best, not needed for school is a great way to help students focus on what they're there to do.
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What's wrong with living a reasonably happy, but not innovative, life, anyway? Why should everything be about rush-rush-rush, run like a rat on a wheel, constant change and turmoil?
But to answer your question... let's see: CRISPR was pioneered in France, high-speed trains, nuclear reactors capable of load-following, basic nuclear physics research (LHC is on the Swiss-French border). Not all innovations involve the Internet or mobile phone fart apps.
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All that did was bring in computer system and software imports from the UK, USA.
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And yet... Where are the great french entrepreneurs and innovators?
France was a tech leader back when we appointed Ben Franklin as the first ambassador, and it's just as much as a tech leader now that it has the carbon-free economy that no other country even plans to achieve this century.
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Yes. Why do you *think* they're banning them?
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Because they're politicians and want to be seen as if they're "doing something" to address some issue, no matter whether that actually addresses the issue?
Re: safeguard the sanctity of the classroom? (Score:2)
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I'd call them populists.
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Yes. Unfortunately. And let's be blunt here, cellphones ain't the problem.
Re:safeguard the sanctity of the classroom? (Score:5, Funny)
Look, I can deal with all kinds of insults. Call me a pinko Commie or a Nazi, call me a fag or a redneck, I can deal with pretty much anything.
But calling me American is really uncalled for. What have I done to deserve that?
Re:safeguard the sanctity of the classroom? (Score:4, Funny)
There are not enough mod points in the world for this post :D
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You're sig references something that is usually considered American.
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No he isn't.
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Mostly because this is a US-centric site and if I made a snide comment about the situation over here in Europe, people overseas would not get it.
People in Europe usually do know a bit about the US, at least when they spend time on US-centric sites, so the joke is internationally understandable.
Think of the children! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Think of the children! (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, wait. It's France.
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Even in the US, you're more likely to be hit by a car on the way home from school than encounter a spree shooter.
That sure makes me feel better about being shot. As long as car accidents are worse we should just never do anything about it...
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Charlie Hebdo. Main difference in France is that men in question have actual automatic weapons, rather than imaginary automatics that are used in US.
Hint: the so called "assault weapons" that are commonly used in school shootings are semi-automatic. Getting an automatic weapon in US is much harder than France. It's extremely difficult to get a legal automatic weapon in US and you'll be monitored by ATF constantly if you get one. The rights ATF gets to help them monitor you if you're a registered owner of an
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No he didn't, not fully automatic. The background checks for Class 3 licenses are extensive and take upwards of a year. Not to mention the costs. A legal full-auto AK will cost more than $20k.
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If he got AK-74 with a "cursory background check", he's committing a felony across entirety of US. Federal law specifically requires class 3 license for an automatic firearm that was made up to 1986, which requires lengthy and complex INVESTIGATION (note - not just a check, but an actual investigation) by ATF. These last around a year on average, and ATF can refuse this license/revoke already granted license at its leisure.
Anything made post 1986, and it's just plain illegal to own for a civilian, period.
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Obvious caveat: I was talking about automatic AK-74. Semi-automatic is a completely different story, which was the entirety of my earlier point.
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Which is wholly irrelevant, because every single state that allows automatic weapons possession requires that possessor meets all federal law obligations.
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Are they really thinking of the children? How will kids call their parents when a shooter with automatic weapons bursts into the school? For something that happens maybe several times per year, this seems rather short sighted.
Oh, wait. It's France.
Even if France were to go completely insane and adopt ridiculous American style wild-west gun laws; I doubt kids calling their parents would help much in a shooter situation. As long as teachers have phones, someone can call the authorities- which frankly is more important than kids calling their mother .
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Considering the best advice if you're hiding is to mute or turn off your phone, likely having these could lead to *more* casualties.
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How will kids call their parents when a shooter with automatic weapons bursts into the school?
Why would you expect them to? What do you expect Dad to do if Junior calls to tell him there is a shooter in the school? Drop what he's doing, pull the AK47 out of the closet, and run down to the school to help? No, Dad would just be in the way, and more likely to get shot by the first responders as he walks in the door carrying a gun fifteen minutes after it is all over.
Junior is better served by paying attention to what is happening around him and protecting himself than in calling Dad or Mom for help. I
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The answer is obvious... bring the phone to school, but leave it off or in airplane mode so that it can't receive any unexpected messages.... if one is only ever pulling out their phone in an emergency situation, then there wouldn't be any issue.
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Are they really thinking of the children? How will kids call their parents when a shooter with automatic weapons bursts into the school? For something that happens maybe several times per year, this seems rather short sighted. Oh, wait. It's France.
It's never happened in America either. Not once has anyone shot up a school with an automatic weapon or anywhere else for that matter..
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Las Vegas
Las Vegas what? I google for "school shooting las vegas" and find nothing relevant.
What school in Las Vegas had a shooter with an automatic weapon? Cite a link.
Good... (Score:5, Insightful)
Much better to take notes on dead trees -- aside from the usual distractions, too easy to get sucked down a rabbit hole of searches about something which the professors said which you found interesting. Save the tablet/phone for after class.
If you can't detach for a few hours, you're addicted.
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mod parent up (Score:2)
All our progress happened without all this new great stuff and we sure do not seem to be progressing forward in modern times...
Delaying gratification is a huge indicator of having a better life; simply forcing students to learn lessons along those lines will do them more good than most every other lesson. Waiting for their phone use alone is a great learning opportunity for them.
Studies and science will and have begun to back such policies; we are talking about big new changes and should be conservative abo
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Then what should occupy a student while the student is sitting quietly between the end of the lecture and the end of the class period?
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Then what should occupy a student while the student is sitting quietly between the end of the lecture and the end of the class period?
Study? Or walk around the school as a type of exercise? Or just sit quietly and prepare for the next class? It's not that long time (5-10 minutes) to control yourself. I did that when I went to school. Stop giving excuses.
That's truancy (Score:2)
Study?
Could you explain further what you mean by this? Early in the school year, I would read ahead in the textbook between the end of the lecture and the end of the class period. But later in the school year, I have finished the textbook, and this is no longer effective.
Or walk around the school as a type of exercise?
In schools in most states of the United States, leaving the classroom during a class period without a hall pass would result in disciplinary action against the student for truancy. Do schools in France have different customs compared to schools i
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Perhaps they can learn patience.
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Could you explain further what you mean by this? Early in the school year, I would read ahead in the textbook between the end of the lecture and the end of the class period. But later in the school year, I have finished the textbook, and this is no longer effective.
Why are you only thinking about reading ahead? To study, you could also revisit what you learned. It helps you to remember what you learned. Unless you think that everything you learned in classes is useless anyway (as many Americans do). To me, everything I learned in class could be used in life one way or the other. It may not be obvious at all, but it is a part of building blocks. What to remember is to "keep in mind" and don't over value what you learned in classes.
In schools in most states of the United States, leaving the classroom during a class period without a hall pass would result in disciplinary action against the student for truancy. Do schools in France have different customs compared to schools in the United States with respect to under what conditions a teacher is willing to grant a hall pass?
Then kids need to learn to behave and
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Solving the problem, or solving the symptom? (Score:2)
Symptom: Kids are on their phones.
Problem: Because school is designed by, and for, idiots, with no regard for biology or psychology. Every child is treated like a rote learning "I can absorb information while sitting in a chair while you spout off dry lists of facts while you scold me for not rigidly adhering to your desire for me to remain quiet and motionless."
There are plenty of ways to learn. Learning by doing (people who learn WAY more in the labs than the classes). People who learn through physical me
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It's tedious s
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Having taught and having a few college degrees in different subjects under my belt, including an education degree, I concur entirely.
There is no "fun" way to learn calculus. Sure, you can use it to solve interesting problems, but the raw mechanics of calc and differential equations aren't things you can master by doing anything other than rote work. Sure, you can potentially teach the underlying concepts in an interesting and fun way, but there's a wide gulf between understanding what something does or how
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> There is no "fun" way to learn calculus.
Bullshit. Go read A Mathematician's Lament [maa.org]
First off, having one teacher for ~30 students is an absolutely shitty way to teach. The fast learners are bored while they wait for the rest of the class. The slow learners are always struggling as they try to understand concepts. The best kind of teaching is one on one, self-directed learning.
When I was in high school one of my classmates was struggling to get 50% in Trigonometry. I spent one hour with him and he g
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Pretty much this. The only good thing I can say about schools up to university level is that they didn't got more in the way of my education than they absolutely had to.
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Symptom: Kids are on their phones (playing games and/or worrying about why they didn't get a 'Like')
There's much more wrong than 'screen time'. Our society pushes image and celebrity down everyone's throat. We value athletes, reality stars and 'likes' more than intelligence, accomplishment, and being yourself. There isn't any "learning" from their cell phone, it's all in a pursuit of instant stimulus and gratification. Small children would rather play dress-up or build a virtual cake than recite their ABC's
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Re: Solving the problem, or solving the symptom? (Score:1)
Problem: Because school is designed by, and for, idiots, with no regard for biology or psychology. Every child is treated like a rote learning "I can absorb information while sitting in a chair while you spout off dry lists of facts while you scold me for not rigidly adhering to your desire for me to remain quiet and motionless."
There are plenty of ways to learn. Learning by doing (people who learn WAY more in the labs than the classes). People who learn through physical memorization (this magical thing called "dancer") and more.
They've heard of the Montessori system in France too.
Re:Solving the problem, or solving the symptom? (Score:4, Insightful)
Most kids would rather be on a cell phone playing games than ANY education method- fun or not.
I'm not saying a diversity of teaching techniques and hands on learning isn't useful- it clearly is a good idea; but the phones should be banned too. The two ideas are not mutually exclusive.
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I agree with your sentiment - it's true that kids are knowledge sponges. The problem is they have little self-control. It's hard enough for adults to resist checking their phone a hundred times a day. Kids just can't do it, and that has a direct impact on whatever else they're supposed to be doing.
Their phones need to stay home.
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I think he knew how to punctuate properly. Maybe he paid attention in class instead of playing Candy Crush?
Show me scientific proof (Score:1)
Where is the peer-reviewed, academically acclaimed study stating screen addiction is bad? I see lots of successful people, both socially and professionally, that have been addicts of technology for as long as basic school. I think this is another populist measure based on wanting to show the electorate "there's stuff being done and it is relevant", only it isn't.
Re:Show me scientific proof (Score:4, Informative)
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Those are interesting articles... aside from the fact they all conclude a priori that these internet and Smartphone use "addictions" are bad. One of them is simply studying the levels of such "addictions" and taking no conclusions whatsoever on their consequences, which in itself is turning the scientific method upside down, starting from conclusion and not from a plausible hypothesis.
The fact most parents, or worse, scientist parents observe their children use a smartphone more intensively than they do or
Wrong (Score:1)
Our main role is to protect children and adolescents. It is a fundamental role of education
Your role is to educate. Protecting children is not your role. You've subsumed that role so you can take more control over the youth and further drive the wedge of state between families. You've assigned yourself as judge, jury, and executioner with regards to whether or not children need to be protected, what they need to be protected from, and how they will be protected from it. The 60s hippies were right about one thing - public schools are nothing more than statist indoctrination camps.
Excellent! (Score:3)
Yeah, we didn't have smartphones, but we had hand held entertainment devices of various sorts.
Formal or informal, guess what, you didn't get to play with them in class, or essentially use them in school at all. If they were ubiquitous then the ban surely would have been formal.
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Same here, and if you did they got confiscated and giving back at the end of the school day, which means you would not get a chance to play during lunch time. I could not afford one at the time, but someone lost his back battery cover (which holds the batteries in) and thought it was stuffed, so he gave it to me. A little work with a soldering iron and I had my own handheld.
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When I was a kid, we had Nintendo game and watch games. Kids with money had them, anyway. And they would often play with them during the lunch break. That was in school.
Great news! (Score:5, Insightful)
Coordinating Afterschool activities (Score:3)
In many schools in my area, the children are forbidden from using the phone during school hours. (Detention if the child is caught using the phone during school hours) However, after school they can use it. Also, many students ride their bike to school or their parents drive them.
Seems like students using the phone after school to let their parents know they're being delayed (my bike has a flat, come pick me up) or the parents are running late so that the other party isn't left waiting/worrying why there is a delay, is an appropriate use of the phone.
Students, you hold the wisdom of the world in hand (Score:2)
Now turn it off and listen to what we think instead.
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Cell phone contents...
5% - Collective wisdom of the world
95% - Collective idiocracy of the world
Turning it off in school to learn the difference - priceless
Mastery Is All (Score:2)
The true master realizes all things hold wisdom, even if negative wisdom to learn what not to do.
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Kids would be better off being given directed ideas for topics to research on a phone and coming up with their own related projects and papers which would then be reviewed, than the factory-style instruction we have today to memorize rote facts. It works so terribly we aren't even producing good trivia players.
Sanctity of Learning? (Score:2)
This is a very very good idea (Score:2)
Glad that someone is doing something about this!
On the plus side, this will also result in fewer teens getting depressed.
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Yet you have more actual freedom in Europe, unless your idea of "freedom" is easily buying a gun, or being subject to the latest and greatest Internet surveillance tech.
Look to incarceration rates of the US vs European countries for an example of this. Look at insurance systems, where you're actually FREE to move between jobs, go to school, etc without threat of medical bankruptcy. Look at drinking ages in Europe vs the US. Hell, look at mass protests in Europe -- they're allowed to happen and aren't bru
Re: As usual (Score:2)
So your argument is that Europe is more free because they let criminals off with a slap on the wrist, and they allow riots to happen.
Neato. I sure wish I lived there.
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Yes. I'd rather side with so-called "criminals" than with authoritarians. At least "criminals" don't have absolute power.
The ability to riot, strike, and shut down a country means that a government doesn't have absolute power -- this is a feature, not a bug.
Re: As usual (Score:2)
Yes. I'd rather side with so-called "criminals"
That's obvious. Everything you say makes you sound like a violent lunatic. I suspect you've spent you share of time in the clink.
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Re: As usual (Score:2)
"No, you're not allowed to smash Starbucks windows and light police cars on fire."
"Shut up bootlicker! I'm fighting da power!!1!1"
I'd like to amend my previous statement to "a violent, petulant man-child".
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Re: As usual (Score:2)
How you've managed to convince yourself that "mass demonstrations where some inconvenience is caused" aren't allowed in the USA is beyond me. Maybe try news sources other than RT?
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Re: As usual (Score:2)
I'm France they shut down cities when it's Friday and they woke up a bit cranky.
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Right. The Constitution says one thing, various governments in the US do another.
Excessive bail is common. So are people being jailed to bully them into a plea bargain. Bye-bye, 5th Amendment. Internal "border" checkpoints can search you and your car at random -- whoops! There goes the Fourth. Right to property. Civil forfeiture anyone?
"Freedom" in the US is a cruel joke unless you're rich.
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The system is designed to suck people in. Take some California cities, where a simple traffic ticket can be $500. Most Americans don't have $500 for an emergency. So it spirals into late fees, contempt-of-court charges, maybe an arrest warrant. Whereas a civilized system would allow judges to equalize punishment by basing fines on income.
As far as excessive bail, read about the case of Kalief Browder. Held without trial on suspicion of a crime, for years because he had the temerity not to plead guilty
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Well, they must be doing something right, considering that the average high school in Europe teaches at a level some colleges in the US would like to aspire to.
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Sacre bleu!
That's a thing they say, right?
Je ne sais quoi!
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Maybe we could start a religion whose sky fairy commands the use of smartphone instead of funny hats.
They did that in Denmark already.