Ban on mobile phones should increase concentration
The Zeeland Calvin College will impose a general mobile ban on all seven school locations from 1 January next year. Students should put the phone in their locker as soon as they arrive at school. They are also not allowed to look at it during breaks. "They come here to learn", says Jan Bakker, chairman of the board of the school community. "The telephone only distracts."
Picture: Type tank
'At home or in the safe', that is the motto of the Calvin College when it comes to mobile phones. Now the students are allowed to keep their mobile in their backpack and scroll on it during short breaks. That is about to change. “From now on, the first action taken by students at school will be putting their mobile phone in their locker,” says Bakker.
Calvin College wants to offer students mental peace with this. “They come to learn," says Bakker. "It should be possible without distractions. Cell phones are designed to keep you looking at them. We also want to protect students against addiction and bad influences from porn or shooting games. We want them to experience that you can live just fine without having a mobile phone nearby all the time.” A third reason is to improve community spirit at school. “The janitors said that the atmosphere has really changed in the schools since the advent of smartphones. One person gave a visual example: the tennis table that was first fought over during the breaks is now untouched.”
Media literacy
Although the measure is an initiative of the school management, the parents and teachers are behind it. “We have done a survey. 82 percent of parents support it and 79 percent of teachers.” Teachers who normally do quizzes with smartphones, such as Kahoot, can now use a laptop for this. “We will make resources available where necessary. The advantage of laptops is that they are on our Wi-Fi network and we therefore have control over them.” The school also offers media literacy classes. “We want to intensify that, so that students see and learn how telephones work. We had a professor visit last Monday who talked about the declining learning performance due to the mobile phone and the burnouts."
From now on, the first action of students at school will be putting the cell phone in their locker
Calvin College is not the only school that is considering mobile policy. Yesterday, the pupils had to deal with new rules for telephone use for the first time at the Kruisweg VMBO location of the Nehalennia school group. Smartphones are now prohibited in classrooms, corridors and toilets. If students catch a teacher or janitor students there, the phone is taken. “At our place, the students are allowed to check their phones during the break in the canteen, on the schoolyard and in the hall,” says location director Peter de Kreij.
Nuisance
The Kruisweg school team urged measures to be taken. At the other HAVO / VWO location, the rules do not yet apply. De Kreij: “For this measure, telephones were allowed in the classroom, but they had to stay in the backpack. It didn't work enough. At one beep, students picked up the phone again. Teachers were hindered by it. In that respect, learning to use telephones has not yet been successful. ”
With one beep, students picked up the phone again
The proposed measure received 'applause' from the school's parents' council. De Kreij: “Of course the students don't like it as much, but the mentors talk about being less accessible and telephone addiction.” Only the online timetable is no longer possible for students to look up on their mobile. They must view schedule changes on the monitors in the school. Lecturers who want to do something with ICT in their lessons have to rely on Chromebooks. It is a pilot that will run until the end of the 2020 school year. “We will make an interim assessment at Christmas, but I can say: the first day went satisfactorily. We only had to take two telephones. ”
Wet
In France, there has been a ban on telephone use at school since 2018. French students are also not allowed to use the telephone during breaks. In the Netherlands there is nothing about this in the law and schools are allowed to determine the rules for telephone use themselves. A report by Duo Education Research in 2017 showed that at 66 percent of schools, the mobile could only be used for a specific assignment in class. At 34 percent of schools, the phone must remain in the bag.
