Tools used for good but we tell kids to make them invisible!

You know, I really do understand why it is that administrators and teachers perceive cell phones and iPhones to be a nuisance at school. Kids are texting their friends and taking personal calls at inappropriate times. Tell me, have we ever taught them about how they SHOULD be using those devices? Seriously! I think before we photocopy more "NO ELECTRONIC DEVICES ALLOWED" posters and plaster them all over the front doors of our schools or ask kids to produce posters that report of the potential brain damage cell phone use can cause, we need to take a step back and examine what we're so afraid of. These days, the potential that these devices possess for education is astounding and we are not willing to go there.

I felt compelled to write about this topic after reading about Dan Woolley, an American filmmaker who was trapped in an elevator shaft for 65 hours after the earthquake in Haiti. He was badly hurt and his iPhone saved his life. He downloaded a first aid app that showed him how to make a tourniquet for his leg using his shirt and a bandage for his head using his sock. In doing research on the internet on how to prevent himself from going into shock, he discovered that he should avoid falling asleep for too long periods of time after sustaining head trauma, so he set an alarm on his smart phone to wake him up every 20 minutes. The DSLR helped him make extra light while waiting for help to arrive.



Could you imagine the potential that tools like this can have at school? These days most phones come with internet browsers and wireless capabilities. More and more kids have them. How many of us complain that we don't have computers in our classrooms? Wouldn't it be great to be able to look anything up on Google, for example, if a question came up in our lessons that we couldn't answer? What if when we asked our students to an in-class assignments, students could use these tools to improve their grammar and vocabulary, or augment their work with research? Cell phones are not just for cheating on tests and yet we accuse kids before it even happens. We have a moral obligation to teach our kids how to use this technology responsibly and ethically.