As you make your bed, so you will lie on it.
The use of phones has been a constant argument when it comes to its usage in schools. While one school of thought believe that allowing students to use phones at will may cause the students to become lazy and unable to think out solutions from their head without much dependency on the gadgets, another school of thought believe that these gadgets are available to help students become better and get information faster for a topic they are confused about.
Personally, I really don't study without my phone. It's always a common thing to run into a word you don't know or a pathophysiology you didn't quite understand how it flows and once I encounter such, I find it hard going further with my studies unless when I've understood properly what it was all about and phone becomes my first line of action as it's easier to access information from with YouTubes and many other study materials available.
The argument with phone will always be the one where any side of the coin you pick will be justifiable.
What are the potential benefits of using phones during classes?
Easy Access To Information:
Phones are often nicknamed "information bank or wealth of information" and this is because every information on earth you want to get are readily available on phones. Teachers won't give you all the information about a particular topic, so allowing students make use of phones during classes is a good way for them to get the holistic details about those topics.
Personal Learning Through Class Recordings:
It's not uncommon for every student not to understand a topic as they are taught in the classroom immediately, allowing them make use of phones in classes will always help them by recording the teachings for their personal use over and over again before they finally understand it at their own pace.
Extracurricular Learnings
While it might pose as distraction a little bit, phones enable us to be knowledgeable about some other things that aren't related to what we were reading. With the unending ads popping up and various online schools where you can apply and learn some tech skills such as data analysis, UI/UX designs and many more from applications like Coursera, Udemy and so on.
This enables you to be knowledgeable in not just what you're studying in school but in many other things.
What are the potential challenges we might encounter?
Dependency:
No one loves suffering or so I guess but I know no one loves counting his fingers and brainstorming when there's a phone that's got a calculator in it that you can just punch the figures and there you go.
This has made students so dependent that no one ever wants to think out solutions for anything again, some might be as bad as not doing anything until the phones are available to assist them with problem-solvings and creative thinking.
Difficulty Identifying Genuine Efforts:
Tests, quizzes and exams are just test to know how much your students have understood about what you've been teaching for a while, allowing them to make use of phones during those periods defeats the purpose of correctly assessing their knowledge because you wouldn't know if they were the ones putting up genuine efforts or just them being smart with their phones.
Knowledge Exclusivity:
What then happens to families that could barely feed talk more of purchasing gadget's for their children? That automatically places the wealthy children ahead of the poor ones even when the poor children are putting up efforts much more than the wealthy ones.
On long term effect, this will basically create robots as humans who are automated to do everything just with their phones making them devoid of critical thinking and problem solving skills which are basic foundations of life.
To fully maximise the benefits of phones without the dangers of dependency and other side effects, there should be a balance in the usage and acceptance of phones. While students could be allowed to make use of phones for certain situations, tests and quizzes should always be an exception.
Finally, self-control and discipline are the bedrock for harnessing the benefits that comes with phones because more will be produced but with these traits in us, we would be in control of our gadgets and not our gadgets controlling us.
Thanks for reading and have a nice day ahead 👍
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Imagine writing tests with phone, lol.
Topping the class would depend on how well one can use the phone and not how knowledgeable one is in the necessary concepts.
Exactly man! Defeats the whole purpose of rewarding efforts
Exactly, will be too bad.
No doubt
You have surely highlighted the pure facts from the use of mobiles. And no doubt they all come with their advantage and disadvantage too. My phone was my means of financial support while I was a student and also aided my academic life. But the distractions remains inevitable
Same here with me... How could I have survived without my phone, Omo
But then the distractions too though, I think it's all about finding the balance too as I wouldn't even advocate for phone banning