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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 30697
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, September 10, 2012 - 10:22 pm: | 
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CoSN examines BYOD safety and security
New report outlines challenges, proposes solutions to address use of personal devices in K-12 schools
From eSchool News staff and wire reports
Sept. 10, 2012
 If schools are inviting students to bring in their personal devices to do school work, then the question every parent should be asking is whether the school district intends to control or censor the content on these devices. If the answer to that is, "Yes," then the parents who permit their children to use PDAs in school are setting them up for suspension or expulsion plus the forfeiture of their device. In my opinion, no student should make his/her PDA available to the school district to do school work at school.
BYOD initiatives are popular, but they present unique security challenges.
A new report from the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), titled “Safe & Secure? Managing the Risks of Personal Devices,” examines today’s advancing Bring Your Own (BYO) initiatives and related safety and security risks facing school districts nationwide.
“Apps and mobile devices are being utilized more and more in education, forcing schools to reexamine their mobile device policies,” said CoSN CEO Keith Krueger. “These continuous advancements are creating an unprecedented set of safety and security challenges for school leaders, so it’s imperative that leaders are prepared and have at their fingertips a set of technical solutions to prevent data breaches and protect personal devices.”
The report outlines leading BYO initiatives—namely, Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), Bring Your Own Network (BYON), and Bring Your Own Cloud (BYOC) / Bring Your Own Applications (BYOA)—and explains the factors driving these initiatives, including ensuring that students receive a 21st-century education and lowering district costs.
But BYO initiatives have created safety and security risks in schools, the report says, including…
* Student safety: Students who own such devices are becoming the targets of theft or physical harm.
* Device theft or damage: Districts could be liable if a student-owned device is stolen or damaged.
* Inappropriate student (and staff) use: Cyber bullying, sexting, cheating, or accessing inappropriate content or websites.
* Data and network breaches: Hacking or unauthorized access to data or computing resources.
* Legal and regulatory compliance: Requirements of the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) in relation to student-owned devices.
In addition, the report provides real-life examples of solutions to address these challenges effectively and includes information about the most preferred technologies for mitigating mobile security risks. This section of the report also provides a table detailing the solutions that provide the recommended protections and notes their advantages. Solutions include wireless authentication, federated identity management, and virtual desktops.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 30631
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 10:41 pm: |
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Some schools tell students to bring own technology
by Kathleen Megan / NEW YORK NEWSDAY
August 26, 2012
If personal technology devices are important to learning the materials or to completing assignments, then schools need to make sure all students have access to one of these devices.
Not so long ago, most school districts had very strict policies: Leave your cellphones and laptops at home.
The schools would provide any technology a student needed. Often, there wasn't much.
But now with districts racing to adopt 21st century learning techniques while facing budget realities, educators are starting to rethink how they view the gadgets kids bring to school.
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In Newington, Superintendent of Schools William Collins unveiled his new technology plan at graduation in June 2011.
"I said that starting in September we'll no longer be pulling cellphones out of your hands, we will be encouraging you to bring them in and use them. You could hear the gasps," Collins said. "We hadn't broken it to the teachers either. You could have heard a pin drop." But when students began bringing in their smartphones, laptops and tablets, Collins said, "not only did the world not come to an end, but it was also very productive." Accepting Reality Increasingly, educators are realizing that it makes no sense to stop students from using the digital tools they use outside of school.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28882
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, December 13, 2011 - 9:36 pm: |
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Getting the good from the gadgets
Lancaster High Schools allows students to use cellphones during breaks, and teachers are using applications on the devices for lessons in the classroom.
By Stephen T. Watson / BUFFALO NEWS STAFF REPORTER
December 12, 2011
The students in Melissa Boehmer's freshman English language arts class at Lancaster High School last week had to define "susurrus," "juddered" and seven other words used in a book the class is reading.
Boehmer handed out pocket dictionaries to her students, but she also let them do something that is verboten in many area classrooms: use their cellphones to look up the words.
After they finished the vocabulary assignment, Boehmer told the students to put away their phones as she moved into a discussion of the latest chapter in Neil Gaiman's "The Graveyard Book."
"What is the rule? Gadgetry for good, not evil," Boehmer said.
That's the idea behind the cellphone policy put in place this fall at Lancaster High School. As long as they're not disruptive, students can use their phones to text, check Facebook or listen to music during lunch or the break between classes.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28786
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, November 28, 2011 - 11:40 pm: |
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Should tweeting teen apologize to Kansas governor?
By Valerie Strauss / Washington Post The Answer Sheet blog
Nov. 27, 2011
See, also, Sam Brownback tweeter: I’m being bullied.
Talk about making a mountain out of a molehill.
Here’s the story, as reported by the Kansas City Star:
A senior from Shawnee Mission East High School went with some students to Topeka to learn about the political process. They listened to a speech by Gov. Sam Brownback and during the event, Emma Sullivan, 18, tweeted this from the back of the crowd: “Just made mean comments at gov. brownback and told him he sucked, in person...”
She hadn’t actually said anything of the kind to Brownback, but The Kansas City Star reported, she said she sent the tweet as a joke to her friends.
That would have been that — except Brownback’s director of communications, Sherriene Jones-Sontag, saw the tweet, didn’t like it a bit and shared it with the Youth In Government program, which had brought the students to Topeka.
Karl R. Krawitz, the principal of Sullivan’s school, was alerted and called her in for a lecture that lasted nearly an hour, the newspaper reported. She was told, she said, that she had embarrassed the school and that “damage control” was necessary.
So Krawitz ordered Sullivan to write an apology to Brownback — and it is due on Monday. She told the Associated Press she has no intention of apologizing because she isn’t sorry.
So should she apologize for saying that she said something to Brownback that she didn’t really say?
Actually, here are some better questions:
How did the adults in this episode manage to allow a disrespectful — and obviously untruthfuly — but ultimately silly tweet make them look foolish?
What is the governor’s spokesperson doing getting a high school student in trouble for a nonsense tweet?
What is a high school principal doing demanding the student make an unnecessary apology to placate the governor’s office?
Is it too obvious to point out that the students were on a trip to learn about the political process and that Sullivan’s First Amendment rights seem to have been abridged here? Last I looked, Americans were allowed to express disrespectful comments about their political leaders.
If Sullivan had been tweeting against school rules (as in, no tweeting on trips to Topeka to learn about the political process), the punishment should hardly be an apology to the governor.
Let’s hope the principal realizes his mistake and allows this whole thing to go away fast.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28626
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, October 27, 2011 - 11:55 pm: |
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Teachers Use Cell Phones in the Classroom
By Jason Koebler / U.S.News & World Report via Yahoo! News
Oct. 27, 2011
You won't find Willyn Webb telling her high school students to put away their cell phones, even though they are technically banned in her Colorado district. She's been using cell phones to augment her lessons at Delta County Opportunity School for years.
It all started when she forgot a stopwatch to time a student's speech, and another student whipped out a cell phone and used its built-in timer.
From there, Webb kept finding new uses for basic text-enabled cell phones. She now uses phones to poll students in class and send homework reminder text messages to students and parents. Students also use a Google text-messaging service that allows them to look up a variety of facts. After seeing how engaged Webb's students are, the school's principal has decided to look the other way.
There are so many laws, regulations and policies that it's impossible to change anything without being in violation of at least one of them.
Halfway across the country, Lisa Nielsen was defying a cell phone ban Mayor Michael Bloomberg placed on New York City schools. As far back as 2008, she was encouraging teachers to reach students via text, and to allow students to use text messaging services to define words and look up facts and figures. She has since taken a post in the office of educational technology for New York City's Department of Education.
Nielsen and Webb eventually connected via E-mails and text messages and coauthored a book of lesson plans called Teaching Generation Text: Using Cell Phones to Enhance Learning.
"We think school should be preparing students for real life--and in real life, people use cell phones," says Nielsen, who authors the blog The Innovative Educator. "If you're making an artificial world inside the school, you're not preparing them for the real world."
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28497
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, October 06, 2011 - 11:10 pm: |
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India announces $35 tablet computer for rural poor
Nation's goal is eventually to see every student have a low-cost device for learning
From eSchool News staff and wire reports
Oct. 5, 2011
Following through on a promise made last year, India introduced an inexpensive tablet computer on Oct. 5, saying the device would deliver modern technology to the countryside to help lift villagers out of poverty.
The computer, called Aakash, or “sky” in Hindi, is the latest in a series of “world’s cheapest” innovations in India that include a 100,000-rupee ($2,040) compact Nano car, a 750-rupee ($15) water purifier, and $2,000 open-heart surgery.
My wife could fly to India and stay for 2 weeks while she has 3 crowns put on her teeth for the price our dentist wants for the same work.
Developer Datawind is selling the tablets to the government for about $45 each, and subsidies will reduce that cost to $35 for students and teachers. In comparison, the cheapest Apple iPad tablet costs $499, while the recently announced Kindle Fire will sell for $199.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28452
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, September 29, 2011 - 12:34 am: |
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N.J. law makes juvenile 'sexting' an educational issue, not a crime
BY TOM HESTER SR. / New Jersey Newsroom
27 September 2011
“Sexting” for most children under age 18 will no longer be a crime in seven months but an issue that will be addressed through education, under a law signed by Acting Gov. Kim Guadagno.
The law (S-2700), would limit admission to the educational program to cases where the juvenile has not been previously convicted of sexually-related crimes; was not aware that his or her actions could constitute a crime and did not have the intent; the offense is related to a condition or situation that would be conducive to change through participation in the educational program, and the benefits to society in admitting the juvenile to the educational program outweigh the harm done to society by abandoning criminal prosecution.
Why is age a factor? What does that have to do with anything? If the other conditions are met, why should it matter if the person is 9 or 99? Or 19, for that matter, and a junior or senior.
The state attorney general, in consultation with the state courts, will develop the educational program. The program will include information regarding the legal consequences of “sexting”, the non-legal consequences, the long term impacts of engaging in the activity, and the possible connection between bullying and cyber-bullying and juveniles sharing sexually suggestive or explicit materials.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28220
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, August 21, 2011 - 4:20 pm: |
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Missouri teachers sue to block social media law
By Kevin Murphy / Reuters via Yahoo! News
Aug 20, 2011
KANSAS CITY, Mo (Reuters) - In the face of a lawsuit, a Missouri state senator defended on Saturday a new state law that will prohibit teachers from communicating privately with students over the Internet.
A teachers group filed a lawsuit Friday afternoon contending the new lawsuit violates free speech and other rights, but the senator who sponsored it says it does nothing of the kind.
"It doesn't stop any avenue of communication whatsoever, it only prohibits hidden communication between educators and minors who have not graduated," said state Senator Jane Cunningham, a St. Louis Republican and key sponsor of the law.
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The law permits teacher-student contact if the Internet site can be viewed by parents, administrators or the public. Teachers and students can still e-mail and text each other as long as someone is copied, Cunningham said.
* * *
Teachers have said the vast majority of their private contacts with students over the Internet are education-related and can be helpful, especially for shy students. The lawsuit made a similar point.
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(Writing and reporting by Kevin Murphy; Editing by Mary Wisniewski and Jerry Norton)
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 28081
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, July 26, 2011 - 10:11 pm: |
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Kalispell schools may allow cellphones
KRISTI ALBERTSON / Kalispell (MT) Daily Inter Lake
July 24, 2011
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The district is considering changing its cellphone, pager and electronic signaling equipment policy to allow students to use cellphones during their passing time and lunch periods. The existing policy allows high school students to use such devices outside the building at lunch.
The new policy also would give teachers the opportunity to use cellphones and other electronic devices as instructional tools.
* * *
Ben Young, a parent and science teacher at Glacier High, urged trustees not to approve the policy, which he called “unenforceable.” Young said allowing students a “carte blanche” use of cellphones during passing time would lead to an increased risk of cheating, “sexting,” bullying and classroom disruption.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 27078
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 02, 2011 - 7:57 pm: |
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Teacher rattles table in class, student calls 911
Associated Press via Yahoo! News
March 2, 2011
ATHERTON, Calif. – A California school teacher was placed on paid administrative leave after he rattled a table to get the attention of his math students, startling an eighth-grade girl who used her cell phone to call police.
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Redwood City School District deputy superintendent John Baker says the teacher was placed on leave because there was a police response.
How stupid is that?
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Information from: Palo Alto Daily News, http://www.paloaltodailynews.com
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 26964
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, February 14, 2011 - 9:10 pm: |
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Teen sexts
Sexting is stupid. But it shouldn't send kids to prison.
A HOUSTON CHRONICLE EDITORIAL
Feb. 13, 2011
Using a cell phone, a teenager takes a photo of his or her naughty bits, then sends it to another kid's phone: That's "sexting."
Like a lot of things kids do, it's stupid and potentially harmful, and it drives parents crazy. But it shouldn't count as a major crime. And unfortunately, as things stand now, it does. Texas law makes no distinction between teens who sext and adults who traffick in child pornography.
A minor sending or receiving a sext photo could potentially be charged with a third-degree felony, serve two to 10 years in prison, pay a fine up to $10,000, and be listed as a registered sex offender. The kid's life would be wrecked. Senate Bill 407 would sensibly downgrade sexting to a Class C misdemeanor for first-time violators under age 18. The sexter and a parent would have to attend an anti-sexting class.
But if the kid didn't get busted again, the court could eventually expunge the misdemeanor. The stupidity could be forgotten. Life could go on.
Last week, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, a conservative Republican, stumped in favor of the bill, which was filed by Sen. Kirk Watson, a Democrat from Austin. They admit that so far, no Texas teen sexter seems to have been charged as a child pornographer.
But they agree that there's no sense in leaving the possibility open.
We concur. We don't want to see a Texas version of the Iowa case in which a male 18-year-old was branded a sex offender after sending a photo of his privates to a 14-year-old girl who'd requested it. Or the Florida case of an 18-year-old rejected boyfriend who sent nude pictures of his ex-girlfriend to dozens of people, including her parents. Those kids were criminally stupid. But they're not criminals.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 26408
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, November 08, 2010 - 12:15 am: |
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With iPods, Kearns High students touch education’s future
By Rosemary Winters / Salt Lake (UT) Tribune
Nov 6, 2010
Nearly 1,700 students at Kearns High snagged a sleek new tool for their book bags on Friday: an iPod touch. Students at the high school screamed with delight during a kick-off assembly that featured students break dancing to digital beats.
“This is the most exciting day of my life,” said Kirsten Leaver, a junior who immediately began tinkering with her new iPod. “It’s so futuristic. You don’t even have to use books anymore.”
Her friend R.J. Hall, a senior, disagreed.
“It’s not even futuristic,” he said. “It’s what everyone should have today.”
That’s the idea behind Kearns High’s push to create 21st-century classrooms. This summer, the school received a $1 million federal stimulus Enhancing Education Through Technology grant. The money purchased iPods and educational applications for every student, and iPads for every teacher.
“It’s like having a computer lab in your classroom,” said Principal Stephen Hess. “What’s exciting about it is how it’s going to increase engagement of students and how it changes the practice of teachers. It’s going to be less ‘set-and-get’ style lectures and more student participation.”
Each iPod comes equipped with 428 applications. Students can keep track of homework assignments and get automatic reminders of due dates, create and study flash cards, and read text books while highlighting key points and looking up unfamiliar words in the dictionary. They also can study the periodic table for chemistry class, answer complex math equations, compose music and learn the constellations in the night sky. Students in an interior design class will be able to design their dream kitchens electronically, instead of with paper and pencil, and e-mail assignments to their teacher.
The iPod means that students can answer their own questions at any time during class, said English teacher Aimee Duran.
Excuse me, but this is mostly crap. The power of technology doesn't lie in augmenting the current system of learning. Its power is in creating a whole new system of learning. We need schools for The 21st Century Student, not just digitized books, paper and pencils.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 26239
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, October 13, 2010 - 12:16 am: |
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Cases Settled on Sexting, Shock Therapy
By Mark Walsh / School Law blog
September 17, 2010
There were two interesting settlements this week in lawsuits I have reported on in the blog.
'Sexting': A Pennsylvania school district "has settled a lawsuit alleging that a principal illegally searched a student's cell phone, found nude pictures she had taken of herself, and turned it over to prosecutors," the Associated Press reports.
The case involved the Tunkhannock Area School District, which was sued by the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania on behalf of a 17-year-old student whose phone was searched by a school principal. The student intended the photos to be viewed by her boyfriend.
Under the settlement, the school district denied any liability or wrongdoing but agreed to pay the student and her lawyers $33,000 to resolve the dispute, the ACLU chapter says in this news release. The student's claims against the a prosecutor's office were not settled and will proceed through litigation, the release said.
In March, I reported here that a federal appeals court ruled [pdf] that the prosecutor likely overstepped constitutional boundaries when he threatened the student with prosecution over the alleged "sexting."
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 26236
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, October 12, 2010 - 11:18 pm: |
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Cell phones increasingly a class act
After years of bans, many schools are allowing the devices to be used as academic tools
By Tara Malone and Lisa Black, Chicago Tribune reporters with over 40 comments
October 11, 2010
With the election weeks away, Fremd High School teacher Jason Spoor asked students in his government class, some of them first-time voters, to research local candidates vying for office.
They would have 15 minutes and one learning tool: their cell phone.
"If you are driving down the street and headed to vote, you don't have a computer at the touch of a hand. You have a cell phone," Spoor told his students last week in Palatine.
The lesson would have been impossible in the past. But with cell phones tucked in the book bags and pockets of three-fourths of today's teens, many high schools are ceding defeat in the battle to keep hand-held technology out of class and instead are inviting students to use their phones for learning.
Under a teacher's guidance, students might record themselves speaking a foreign language, text an answer to an online quiz or send themselves a homework reminder.
* * *
As a first step, Wheaton administrators allowed students to use cell phones before and after classes last year, instead of requiring them to be powered off at all times.
* * *
Students will be disciplined if they arrive late to class because of phone conversations, if they use them to cheat or if they act inappropriately, such as swearing or talking loudly. Last year, when phones were banned, students would leave class to use their phone in the bathroom — "the place you wouldn't want them to use their cell phone," Chamberlin said.
* * *
This year, Township High School District 211 rewrote its policy that prohibited cell phone use during the school day after "literally thousands" of students landed in the dean's office for misusing them. The northwest suburban district — which includes Fremd High School — now allows students to use them in designated areas like the cafeteria and front foyer as well as in classrooms under a teacher's guidance.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 26139
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, September 21, 2010 - 11:30 pm: |
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MP3 ban hits sour note with Natick High students
By Kathleen Burge and Megan McKee / Boston Globe Staff
September 21, 2010
NATICK — Students at Natick High School are protesting a new policy this year that bans iPods and other electronic devices in all academic areas of the school, including study halls and classrooms.
The policy change has prompted nearly 300 students and others to sign an online petition and many others to support a Facebook page opposing the ban, which was supported by Natick principals and other district administrators. The new policy allows students to use their Mp3 players in the cafeteria and the school’s front hallway.
“They’re a legitimate study tool when you’re trying to tune out the background noise of people talking and conversation flying by and just focus on the work that you’re doing right now,’’ said Sean Flaherty, the Natick High School senior who started the petition and Facebook page to protest the new policy. “I think you can be a lot more productive if you plug your headphones in and listen to music.’’
* * *
Globe correspondent Katrina Ballard contributed to this report.
One reader commented:
we survived perfectly fine in high school with no cell phones or pagers, no internet (and only a hand-full of Apple IIe computers in a lab/typing room), and no calculators in our math and chemistry classes...oh, and no computers either in chemistry class  hehe.....High schoolers have become way too dependent on frivlous techno-toys, and they need to learn to shut them off at appropriate times and learn/think without them always being with them.
To which another commented:
these old people, and their ill-informed comments.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 26121
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, September 17, 2010 - 12:32 am: |
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Video – Response to principal who bans social media
Scott McLeod / Dangerously Irrelevant blog
September 15, 2010
Much like the New Jersey librarian who ‘just said no to Wikipedia,’ New Jersey principal Anthony Orsini received national attention for his letter to parents encouraging them to ban Facebook for their children. Here is an excellent rejoinder by Lisa Nielsen. [The YouTube video is here.]
The overlay of the video on one site says, "What if instead of banning, we teach proper behavior and deliver consequences and rewards as appropriate?" What a novel idea! I'd add that teaching a proper regard for the liberty of freedom of speech is paramount.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Username: Admin
Post Number: 23650
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: 
Votes: 2 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, July 16, 2009 - 9:05 pm: |
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Miami-Dade Plans to Confront 'Sexting' Problem
Katie Ash / Digital Education blog
July 15, 2009
The board for the Miami-Dade County school district approved a plan today to educate students about the legal and safety issues related to “sexting,” the recent craze among adolescents of sharing nude or sexually provocative photos over cellphones.The vote makes Miami-Dade among the first of the nation's largest urban districts to formally address the emerging problem.
35sexting_515.jpg
Under the plan [pdf], the 345,000-student district would revise its current cellphone policy—which allows students to bring the devices to school, but requires them to be turned off while on campus—or create new rules related to the use of mobile technologies. District officials will introduce additional lessons related to tech safety beginning this coming school year and train teachers to use them.
School personnel would also reach out to parents to raise awareness of the problem and give them tools to head off the behavior. They would also work with local and state law enforcement officials, as well as government agencies, to review current laws and come up with guidelines for protecting students against unfair or inappropriate prosecution under laws that may have been crafted for adults.
As we wrote about in Edweek last month, some minors have been charged with adult sex crimes after sending inappropriate photos of themselves or their peers to others via cellphones. Such images can fall into the category of child pornography in the eyes of the law.
Here's a nugget from the Miami Herald's piece on the plan:Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said he would like to work with government and law enforcement agencies to develop a cutting-edge School Board policy -- and preach the dangers of sending racy pictures.
''This is to protect kids, to make them aware of the legal implications of some of their virtual transactions,'' Carvalho said.
As sexting has grabbed public attention, and teenagers and educators have gotten caught up in the legal and other consequences of the practice, school officials have been urged to respond with more precise rules around cellphone use. They’ve also been encouraged to provide information to students, teachers, and parents about the dangers of sexting, including the permanent digital record it creates.
The American Association of School Administrators, based in Arlington, Va., for example, has offered webinars and tip sheets on the subject and is developing a toolkit for administrators. And the National Center for Prosecution of Child Abuse, an arm of the Alexandria, Va.-based National Association of District Attorneys, has been calling for a more careful consideration of laws used to charge offending teenagers.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 23373
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, June 21, 2009 - 6:25 pm: |
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Cell phone ringtones can pose major distraction, impair recall
By Gerry Everding / Washington University in St. Louis Press Release
May 28, 2009
A flurry of recent research has documented that talking on a cell phone poses a dangerous distraction for drivers and others whose attention should be focused elsewhere. Now, a new study in the Journal of Environmental Psychology finds that just the ring of a cell phone may be equally distracting, especially when it comes in a classroom setting or includes a familiar song as a ringtone.
"In any setting where people are trying to acquire knowledge and trying to retain that information in some way, a distraction that may just seem like a common annoyance to people may have a really disruptive effect on their later retention of that information," said the study's lead author, Jill Shelton, a postdoctoral psychology fellow in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.
The study includes an experiment in which Shelton poses as a student seated in the middle of a crowded undergraduate psychology lecture and allows a cell phone in her handbag to continue ringing loudly for about 30 seconds.
Students exposed to a briefly ringing cell phone scored 25 percent worse on a test of material presented before the distraction.
Students tested later scored about 25 percent worse for recall of course content presented during the distraction, even though the same information was covered by the professor just prior to the phone ring and projected as text in a slide show shown throughout the distraction. Students scored even worse when Shelton added to the disturbance by frantically searching her handbag as if attempting to find and silence her ringing phone.
"Many of us consider a cell phone ringing in a public place to be an annoying disruption, but this study confirms that these nuisance noises also have real-life impacts," Shelton said. "These seemingly innocuous events are not only a distraction, but they have a real influence on learning."
Titled "The distracting effects of a ringing cell phone: An investigation of the laboratory and the classroom setting," the study was conducted at Louisiana State University, where Shelton received her doctoral degree. Her co-authors in the LSU psychology department include Emily Elliott, Sharon Eaves and Amanda Exner.
The study explores cognitive differences in how we respond to auditory distractions, specifically whether we process these interruptions using a voluntary, top-down, executive-level shift in attention or as a more reflexive, automatic and involuntary reorientation of attention.
Perhaps most surprising, the study found that unexpected exposure to snippets of a popular song, such as those often used as ringtones, can have an even-longer-lasting negative impact on attention.
In this phase of the experiment, students in a laboratory were tested on simple word-recognition tasks while exposed to a range of auditory distractions, including irrelevant tones, standard cell phone rings and parts of a song very familiar to most LSU students. The song, an instrumental version of the LSU fight song, was then being played incessantly around campus as LSU football made its fall 2007 run to the national college championship. The song also became a popular cell phone ringtone.
"When we played the fight song as part of our lab experiments, the distraction factor lasted longer," Shelton said. "It slowed down their decision-making performance for a longer time than even a standard ringtone."
Thus, people who use popular songs as a personal ringtone may be increasing the odds their cell phone rings will be more distracting. "Depending on how familiar people are with these songs, it could lead to an even worse impairment in their cognitive performance," she said.
The study raises concerns for people who attempt to concentrate while being bombarded by beeps and buzzes from incoming email or text messages. Findings suggest the potential for distraction is greater if the ring tone has some special meaning or personal relevance, such as a custom tone that identifies a call as coming from a parent, close friend or boss at work.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Cell Phones and Sleep Deprivation: Are We Finally Waking Up to the Reality?
Vicki A. Davis / Cool Cat Teacher Blog
May 27, 2009
Last year, in the blog post Kids Sleep with Cell Phones: Are They Suffering from Connection Addiction? students had shared with me a digital citizenship principle that they believed strongly.
"In this gcast podcast, I discuss what my son told me about his friends "sleeping with their cell phones" under their pillow and texting through the nightI've talked to three different groups of students and all of them report that over half of their friends will cell phones sleep with them under their pillow on vibrate and text through the night."
This is one common thing that I've shared while traveling around and speaking about digital citizenship -- Digital Health and Wellness and Addictive issues are important.
The New York Times now has an article Texting May Be Taking a Toll in their health section about this very same thing.
"The phenomenon is beginning to worry physicians and psychologists, who say it is leading to anxiety, distraction in school, falling grades, repetitive stress injury and sleep deprivation.
Dr. Martin Joffe, a pediatrician in Greenbrae, Calif., recently surveyed students at two local high schools and said he found that many were routinely sending hundreds of texts every day.
“That’s one every few minutes,” he said. “Then you hear that these kids are responding to texts late at night. That’s going to cause sleep issues in an age group that’s already plagued with sleep issues.”"
The smartest ideas I've heard are one's we've adopted here at the Davis house -- cell phones are to be docked in the KITCHEN between 9 and 10 pm each night. Does it always happen -- NO!! Often the cells sneak with the kids into their rooms - and other parents say the same thing.
I had a comment left on the old post yesterday that says:
"Seriously? What is wrong with the parents? I haven't even owned a cell phone (i just don't see the problem with being away from the phone for a period of time). I don't get it."
Well, this comment comes from someone who perhaps doesn't have teenagers. Teenagers do things we don't agree with all of the time! That is life! They aren't robots, they are their own person and haven't yet formed the parts of their brain that help them have wise judgment and discernment.
I remember two young kids in one of our training classes for Digiteen (done by my 9th graders for the 5th graders) admitting that they sent 500 text messages in one day and went for over 48 hours without sleeping from it!
Sometimes the kids need to know to turn off their cell, but parents must beware lest four of our fingers point back at us. I'll never this scene from an old post Going from "It" to "Out" Dealing with Network Withdrawal:
"But there was a little boy in the corner. His kite wouldn't fly.
You see. His Mom was on her cell phone.
The little sad boy with his lip quivering was trying to get the kite in the air while the Mom was giving her half attention as she exclaimed why she didn't like flying kites any more.
Her body was there. She wasn't.
Parents need to wake up
I'm tired of hearing parents complain about kids and cell phones when parents are horrible offenders too!
I see so many people so busy being somewhere else.
We're trying to be "it" and don't want to be left "out" so we forget "it." We forget the meaning in life, I think."
Cell phones are things. Now, if they connect us to people in positive ways, that is great. But really between 9 pm and 6 am they should be off unless you're out somewhere. This is NOT popular view with my teenage son!!! I am really bad for saying it.
But he had a very interesting conversation last night with his Dad about the history of Ireland. And that is it!
Parents, what do you do about texting? What are your cell phone rules? And if we listen to students such as done with Digiteen, they will tell us about these behaviors and we can deal with them before they even hit our own radar!
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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'Sexting' law needs to be updated
A Newark (OH) Advocate Editorial via the Zanesville (OH) Times Recorder with reader comments
April 23, 2009
We might never understand why so many teenagers decide to take nude pictures of themselves with cell phones and transmit the images to others, who usually click on forward.
In fact, there's little hope of stopping teens even after a "sexting" suicide in Ohio and the much-publicized felony-level charges against a local teen who faced years of registering as a sex offender. There always will be some who don't understand the future ramifications of their poor decisions.
A recent study by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy reports one in five teenage girls said they've electronically sent or posted nude or semi-nude images of themselves.
Not surprisingly, Ohio law fails to cover this new act of clearly unacceptable behavior, tying the hands of prosecutors to file charges that don't necessarily fit the crime.
The local teen originally was charged with illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material, even though she also was the "minor victim." A plea deal spared the 15-year from being labeled a sex offender and has helped spur lawmakers to suggest making sexting a misdemeanor charge instead.
That's a change we're willing to support, at least for a first-time offender, even though we wonder if watering down the seriousness of the offense is really the issue.
We had no problem with the charge filed against the local teen, only the sex-offender status and registration that would have become heavy baggage for any young person trying to enroll in college or find a job.
Minors don't deserve a sex-offender tag unless their crimes are far more extreme, violent or repeated numerous times. A lone photo does not qualify.
The law also needs to focus on those who forward any sexting messages they receive, although the mere receipt of the pictures is only problematic if they were solicited from the sender.
We agree lawmakers need to update Ohio law, but we urge them to not forget about the seriousness of these offenses and to ensure the new law remains a deterrent, albeit a fair one.
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