Journal Question #3

Question: Cell phone use is increasing, though it is still repressed more than accepted as an educaitonal tool in U.S. high schools. Think about how the dynamic interaction between you and your students would change if you can say, "Please put away your cell phones, we are not ready to use them yet" instead of, "Put away your cell phones, you know they are not allowed during class time"? Discuss your viewpoint of cell phones in the classroom.

I think it would be tough for me to accept the use of cell phones in the classroom. First, students are prohibited from having cell phones on them during the school day so the use of them in my class would violate a school policy. This undermines the rule for all teachers, which could lead to problems. Second, I know that majority of students have cell phones but I know that there are students here and there that do not have them. I would not want to make them feel excluded by asking students to use them during class. Also, how could a teacher possibly monitor the use of all of the students simultaneously? How does a teacher know that a student isn't texting another student while also completing the task assigned by the teacher? I think the use of cell phones in the classroom opens up too many possibilities for problems and these outweigh the benefits.