I've recently retired from teaching in secondary. I have been saying for the last few years that everyone is massively underestimating the effects of mobile phone use in school. Pupils with a phone in their pocket are not for one second completely focused on school, lessons, work etc. To them, their phone is a LOT more important than school. Than anything!

@marianhunt8899

2 ай бұрын

It's an addiction and the smartphone makers have knowingly made it that way. As usual though the people who created the problem don't get blamed, instead the victims get blamed. Just like the tobacco and junk food industries. The perpetrators go free, the public suffer.

@tomgreene1843

2 ай бұрын

Ah yes ...have you seen any protest at the enormous wealth of the techie moguls ??@@marianhunt8899

We should ban tiktok point blank. It makes our children stupid.

@kay2kin92

2 ай бұрын

That's the PLAN ! ...

No phones until sixteen? Sounds good to me. Let the kids buy their own phones with their first jobs.

Policy makers haven't got the foggiest what's going on with this as their kids are away, term to term, at boarding school and out of sight.

Love Katherine, a wise and brave lady.

Every day on my way to work I cycle past school children walking to school with their heads down glued to their phones. Once you see child after child doing this, it really shocks you. We are in the technology age and its moving so fast. We don't yet understand the consequences and to give this technology to children seems irresponsible.

Surely parents have responsibilities too when it comes to implementing discipline to their children. Everything starts from home.

@JONDUCK1

3 ай бұрын

Yes. But the problem is ubiquity. Parents will give their 11 year old a smartphone because they know to not have one will lead to bullying, even though they also know that having the phone will expose their child to cyberbullying. Being able to say you can't do or have something because it's against the law will enable parents to do what most instinctively know is right in this instance, I think. At the moment if you sent your kid to an average UK comp saying they're not allowed a mobile you would essentially have placed a target on them, just as I remember kids who weren't allowed to watch TV when I was at school 30 odd years ago, and speaking as someone who grew up without even a landline!! 😂 It singles you out. If no kid can legally have a smartphone, it's a win.

@nicolagrant5450

2 ай бұрын

But they mostly take no responsibility. I've had a parent tell me to talk louder because her son talks mom- stop. Tried it. Never worked. He's got adhd but my daughter does have it and I'd never say that. Many people using SEN/ ALN as an excuse for poor parenting and discipline

To clarify, the main thing I find so utterly inspiring about Ms Birbalsingh's methods is how she seems to constantly take me through some mentally challenging problems (eg. prayers in school grounds) and then conclude with such pragmatic solutions. Is that not the reason God created smart people?

Jim Rohr the businessman said “poor people have big TVs and rich people have big libraries.” Smartphones are the new TVs. As a private teacher, I have taught a ten year old who had nothing to say every single day. She spent all day every day on TikTok. Her family took her on holiday to Thailand. She still spent all her time on TikTok. We do not know the damage this is doing to adults. We certainly don’t know the damage tech and the internet is doing to children. A colleague in Egypt said no screens at all before the age of 2. She said the strip down the middle of the brain is thinned by exposure to screens, and before the age of 2 , exposure to screens will cause autism. And we see mothers handing a screen to their babies to keep their babies and toddlers tablets. There is no data on longterm effects of social media on adults. There is no data on the effects on Children. What we do know is groomers, county lines, gangs and more contact children by their phones. Why give your kid a phone?

Woman of the year.

@wolfhugs2221

3 ай бұрын

Absolutely.

Thanks Spectator for putting this chat in a separate video. Your political & international analysis is great, but I enjoy hearing more about these issues that hit closer to home

Katharine is right. No phones at school, the situation is the same in South Africa.

8 hours? I had a kid with 16 to 18 hours.a day.. KB spot on again. .

Wonderful commentary.

You can't really do much, legally & practically, about use in the home, but you won't get compliance outside of there until you fine parents. Going after the service side only -without completely destroying online anonymity (something not worth the cost) - will fail. Another option could be for the government to subsidise a version of a smartphone that has inbuilt restrictions that parents can get for their children

they're both absolutely right.

Mobiles should be like cigarettes or alcohol..illegal to buy under 16

SPEAK TRUTH AND OWN IT PEOPLE 👍🇬🇧👌

I got fed up of the phone battle.

I've been saying this for the last ten years. In fact I'd go a lot farther. No access to the Internet until 18, maybe even 21 (considering that the brain doesn't fully develop until 25). This would eliminate almost ALL problems - and there are plenty - associated with young people and the Internet. Let's face it, they don't need it... there are three generations alive today who survived just fine without the Internet. Word processors in schools and at home, fine, but no online access. Then, when they reach the permitted legal age... eat your heart out! Btw, bi-products would include... they would learn to read books, spell properly, read maps, research using libraries, touch grass, communicate with humans, etc. And it wouldn't be anymore difficult to implement, than parents not allowing their children to smoke, drink or drive under age.

I disagree, strongly. It's down to parenting. Stop placing responsibilities on to anyone but the parents. It's not the job of government, teachers or police to parent. It's the job of us parents. My child is not addicted to her phone, she's not on social media. She focused on her education and now on her career. And that took hard, consistent work to parent her as a lone disabled parent. I'm not alone, many colleagues are the same.

Theres no way id ever do anything you thought I was going to do

I think this needed a proof-watch...

Children become marionettes...Is that a destiny you would have wanted for yourself ?

This actually a good policy to ban them in schools. But I don't agree with the concept of banning them for children altogether. The world is often a horrible place and the safetyist notion of pretending it's not is harmful in the long run. Children should be educated better in a fortified media studies curriculum and critical thinking. These children will grow up to be adults who continue to not be media savvy otherwise. Please look into the book 'The coddling of the american mind' for more on safetyism.

@DarthQueefious

3 ай бұрын

Bumps, scrapes, conflict makes the mind less fragile. The addictiveness of smart phones & tablets, plus the indoctrination & innocence-destroying impacts of them are a different matter. It's thee job of education to make them media savvy

@AbAb-th5qe

3 ай бұрын

​​​​​@@DarthQueefious I agree that it's for education to fortify against things like indoctrination and other forms of malign influence. But to what extent are they choosing to not retain their 'innocence' in terms of knowledge? Learning of stuff forbidden by adults is alluring rebellion for them. rebelliousness is also part of childhood. There need to be suitable ways of doing that.

@wolfhugs2221

3 ай бұрын

They could have dumb phones - can call and text but no Internet access.

@AbAb-th5qe

3 ай бұрын

@@wolfhugs2221 That's quite effective censorship of children. Is that what you want?

@ettcha

2 ай бұрын

​@@wolfhugs2221Dumb phones and, I can't believe I'm saying this, a little bit of Chinese style restrictions on certain types of apps and features. But that's more of a last ditch nuclear option. Parents should be the ones nipping all this in the bud before government comes in with laws that can end up creating other issues. Not every parent is equipped with the knowledge, but that's an easy fix if everyone up and down the chain makes the effort.

A nasty swipe at classroom teachers from this Headteacher...not a good look!

@CatherineX-ph3on

2 ай бұрын

You see a nasty swipe. Other people see a statement of truth. If you have been in classrooms like I have, you would have very different ideas. I am sticking with private teaching. No way would I teach in a school. I did two weeks of a specialist programme in October. I didn’t go in for most of the second week. Absolutely horrendous behaviour from the secondary school children that is going to hit society in the next couple of years.

In 1930’ most working kids Were smoking? 1800s all kids Were drinking beer, because it was cleaner than Water..

@AbAb-th5qe

3 ай бұрын

Society loves a moral panic. It gives a sense of control to people. Remember 'It's 10pm, do you know where your children are?'

@Romdormer

3 ай бұрын

​@@AbAb-th5qeHave you been in a school lately?

never used twattwot I enjoy life..