Stephen Lecce Has a Problem With His Tense

The Cellphone Problem Isn't Growing, It's Fully Developed!

The problem with cellphone distractions is not growing. It is fully developed. The problem started growing some 16-17 years ago.  

Stephen Lecce, Ontario’s current Minister of Education, and everyone else who thinks the problem with cellphone distractions is only now growing, are not aware of what happened soon after smart phones became part of teenage consumer culture. It started with the Blackberry and progressed to the iPhone and beyond.

Soon after smartphones, designed and engineered to attract attention (a.k.a. addict), were introduced, schools became inundated with the problem. Phones soon came to dominate school and classroom culture and more importantly, the lives of students. Phones were on desk tops, in hands while walking the halls, heads were down while either walking the hallways or sitting in class, students were “doom scrolling”, watching videos on YouTube, playing games, and the worst of the worst - endlessly and desperately searching for self-worth and self-esteem via acceptance via receiving likes or whatever via their social media.

There is a reason why “Crackberry” became the nickname of Blackberry soon after its inception. Highly addictive, no question.

Imagine high school students during the 1980s sitting in classrooms with video game systems (Intellivision, Atari?), stereos, telephones, cameras, video cameras, TVs, VCRs, and various handheld electronic games (ie., Electronic Quarterback) on their desks. Imagine students switching game cartridges, switching VCR tapes, or switching TV programs while they were supposed to be learning or working on completing assignments. It would be counter to everything being in classroom should be about.

But, as preposterous a thought as that is, this is what the current state of classrooms is often like. The difference is all those distractions are found within one handheld gizmo.

However, cellphones are not solely responsible. They were aided and abetted by the implementation of the Ministry of Education’s (Ontario) assessment, evaluation, and reporting policy document “Growing Success”, published in 2010. Probably the most controversial aspect of “Growing Success” are the sections which concern deadlines and multiple attempts to demonstrate learning. Or perhaps, the controversy rests in how individual school boards interpreted and implemented them. Either way, the confluence of smartphones as teenage consumer products and the implementation of “Growing Success” was and is a disaster for many students.

In theory, “Growing Success” is well meaning and well intentioned - sensible even, and works well for students who need extra-time and may benefit from using alternative methods to demonstrate what they have learned. If the initial method of assessment or evaluation doesn’t allow them to accurately and appropriately apply and/or communicate what they know and understand, then using an alternative method – another attempt – may be in their best interest.

However, sometimes the difference between theory and practice can be incomprehensible. What of the relatively common perspective of, “if I don’t actually have to hand things in on time, why should I?” or students who, with intent, avoid (a.k.a. “skip”) tests even when the dates are set well in advance and are given another attempt to demonstrate their learning? Another attempt after other students showed up on the date and wrote their tests for better or for worse. Or students who plagiarize with intent and are allowed another opportunity to submit an assignment?

More importantly, sometimes, what about the students who endeavour to manage and organize their time as best they can to meet scheduled deadlines when others are seemingly receiving individual advantage over them? This is not to suggest that hard and fast deadlines are the holy grail of the process of learning. Not at all. In the world of education in Ontario before “Growing Success”, the great majority of teachers were understanding of the strains and stresses of their students: studying, completing assignments, part-time jobs, extra-curricular activities, home life, and the reality that adolescence is one of the most difficult times in peoples’ lives. It’s always been difficult to be a teenager. As a result, extension of assignment deadlines and dealing with questionable results on tests and exams was often dealt with whenever and where appropriate.

For the longest time, one of the most significant purposes of school was socialization with time management and organization being key components. Executive functioning, which takes place primarily in the prefrontal cortex of the brain, refers to a series or collection of processes which help with cognitive skills such as organization, sequencing, regulation of behaviour, working memory, problem solving and inhibition. Concerns regarding the impact of substance use (drugs/alcohol) and trauma to the brain via concussive injuries on executive functioning, among other aspects of human cognition, have been documented for years. Perhaps the most important question of smartphone use should not be based on their distractable nature. Instead, perhaps it should be based on their design and engineering which can promote addictive behaviour which can significantly impact young peoples’ executive functioning.

Going to school and becoming educated was to supposed to help with the process of developing citizens/citizenship, problem solving and decision-making skills, and communication skills, among other aspects of life that would assist young people in becoming healthy and well-adjusted adults. However, hen learning and developing the steps involved in critical thinking becomes vague and superfluous to the process of being in school, what happens to the value of education? If students can seemingly do things on their own time; at their own convenience, what does that say about the value of the learning process and being in school?

In a post for another time, the importation of technology into education as well as the implementation of policies such as “Growing Success” are part of the wider effects of neo-conservative/neo-liberal agendas. Mike Harris’ so-called “Common Sense Revolution” of the 1990s ushered in Ontario’s version of Reaganomics and Thatcherism in education when the Ministry of Education adopted a per-pupil funding model. A further analysis of the changes in Ontario’s education system with regard to various legislative, policy, and regulatory reforms since the 1990s is warranted in order to make sense of the bigger picture.

This does not mean there is a direct line of cause and effect from the attack on publicly funded education that began in the mid to late 1990s in Ontario to the current problems of smartphones or “Growing Success”. However, there is a strong correlation.

For now, to think issues related to smartphone distraction are only now growing and becoming problematic and are occurring in a vacuum, is either naïve or politically opportunistic.