Some Classrooms Let Students Cell Phones Ring To Learn

Between teacher and parent worries over sexting or having ringing cell phones distract from classroom lessons, a few teachers around the country have decided that if you can’t ban cell phones, how about making use of them to improve education? A few schools and teachers are now making cell phones part of their lesson plans in hopes of getting more tech savvy students interested in learning by using their favorite high-tech devices.

One example is being reported in Wesley Chapel, Fla.; where high school students there are using cell phones to learn Spanish in Arianna Leonard’s classes. An Associated Press reporter says this Spanish teacher’s classes all start like most others art Wiregrass Ranch High School, except when Leonard starts the class assignment by telling her students, “Take out your cell phones,” in Spanish.

The students start with Leonard sending them a text message in Spanish to their cell phones. The text message instructions are simple ones, “Find something green.” “Go to the cafeteria.” “Take a picture with the school secretary.”

This text message lesson on Spanish vocabulary is a kind of digital scavenger hunt. Text messages come after class as homework reminders. Some students copy their notes by using their cell phones cameras to take a picture.

Leonard tells reporters, “I can use my cell phone for all these things, why can’t I use it for learning purposes. Giving them something, a mobile device that they can also use for fun, giving them another avenue to learn outside the classroom with that.”

A Pew Internet and American Life Project survey finds 71% of teenagers had a cell phone by early 2008. That high percentage remains high not matter the race, income or other family factors for the student. Many students have access to home networks, wireless internet access and a smartphone at home that school districts could only wish for, with an unlimited technology budget.

However, what’s consistently gotten more attention from parents, teachers, school districts and the news media have been the problems with mixing inventive teenagers and cell phones. Problems like sexting or taking and sending inappropriate pictures with cell phone cameras or using cell phones to cheat in school. But, in some places, negative attitudes to using cell phones in school are slowly changing. “It really is taking advantage of the love affair that kids have with technology,” says Dan Domevech, executive director of the American Association of School Administrators. Domevech adds, “the kids are much more motivated to use their cell phone in an educational manner.”

Take a look at the cell phone you are probably carrying right now in your pocket or purse. Even if it’s a slightly older cell phone, it is basically a small computer, able to check e-mail on the Internet, do Internet searches as well as take and send pictures or video and record and play podcasts.

Even school districts with tough anti-cell phone use policies, concede that eventually those “Don’t Bring Cell Phones to School” rules will have to change. “We can’t get away from it, says Bay County, Fla. School Superintendent Bill Husfelt. His 27,000 student district doesn’t allow cell phones inside of school buildings during class hours for any reason. Husfelt adds, “But we’ve got to do a lot more work in trying to figure out how to stop the bad things from happening.”

In some parts of the country, high school students have actually been arrested over how they use their cell phones. In that Bay County, Fla. school district, 7 students were taken in by police after getting into a fight on campus that started because of cell phone messages. Other teenagers have been arrested for ‘sexting’, or sending indecent pictures on their cell phones.

In Sycamore Township, Ohio a girl committed suicide last year because of the harassment and bullying she was getting in text messages.

A recent survey finds more than 35% of teenagers admit to using their cell phones to cheat in school. But cell phones are becoming so common, it’s also becoming an increasing hassle for teachers and school staff to police them. Husfelt says, “It’s just a conflict taking them up and having to deal with them. It’s too disruptive.”

Fortunately, teachers who have started to use cell phones as an education device report most students are willing to abide by the rules. They add that cheating and bullying existed before cell phones became common, and will continue with or without cell phone access. However, once cell phones become an educational tool, teachers say notice that bad cell phone behavior among teenagers always declines.

Kipp Rogers likes how math classes at his Passage Middle School in Newport News, Virginia use cell phones. A few years ago, a class he was teaching was short one calculator for a test. Rogers made an exception and allowed one student to use his cell phone to do his calculations. Twelve classes at Rogers’ school, including science and English, as well as math, now use cell phones regularly.

The Middle School students use the phones to do research through text messages and the Internet browsers many cell phones now have. Teachers blog on their cell phones. Students often use the camera to snap quick pictures for assignments requiring pictures.

When students don’t have their own cell phones, classes often work in groups, sharing cell phones. In Pulaski, Wisconsin, Spanish teacher Katie Titler uses the video recording feature on some camera cell phones to have her students record short videos of them speaking Spanish phrases, for tests. Titler says, “Specifically for a foreign language, it’s a great way to both formally and informally access speaking abilities, which is really hard to do on a regular basis because of class sizes and lack of time.”

In the Annville-Cleona School District in Pa., Math teacher Jimbo Lamb has his students use cell phones to answer questions through a web polling site. He says that instantly, he can tell how many students understand a particular lesson they are working on. Lamb says, “this is technology that helps us to be more productive.”

With cell phones and smartphones being considerably cheaper than buying standard computers and internet access, some school districts and even state education departments are experimenting with ways to use cell phones for internet access as well as teacher-student communications.

For the first time ever, the Georgia Department of Education has decided to hand out grants for schools their to “pioneer the use of handheld computers.” It wants to see if cell phones, smart phones and personal digital assistants (PDAs) can engage students better than traditional book and paper.

Does your school or class use cell phones, smart phones, iPhones or similar devices in an unusual and educational way? Let us know about it (email: BPrice@wcpo.com) and we'll share your handheld computing techniques with others.