Skip suggested that we talk about cell phones. Hello! A perfect topic, since we are doing the two other housekeeping discussions on seating charts and bathroom passes this week anyway.
My own position is that cell phones need to be completely out of the room. Of course, that is too much to ask when it concerns teachers. Heaven forbid that a lawyer or doctor ask for and get silenced cell phones in a court of law or an operating room.
I have just never quite known what to do about them. I do know one thing. Some of the worst confrontations I’ve ever had with kids have been over cell phones. I’ve always said that at the very first infraction I would take the phone.
Then the kid comes up after class and I don’t want the responsibility of keeping it safe, with all the other stuff going on, so I give it back to them after class, which certainly doesn’t put enough fear in them to keep from doing it again in the very next class.
I’ve had a little more success with telling the kids that they can text all they want during the three minute mid-class break. But that really doesn’t work either – I never can stop the CI once it gets going and I forget the break, even though the research calls for brain breaks every twenty minutes.
I’m pretty much a loser with cell phones. Surely one among us has the magic plan to deal with them! Give!