Quote:
Originally Posted by Son Of Coco
"But Massey University researcher Anne Ryan, who has studied bullying, said neither the restorative justice nor punitive approach would eliminate the problem."
This this statement from an expert gives you some indication of why. I might be reading it wrong, but she seems to basically be saying do nothing. Meanwhile she's got some bleeding heart rhetoric going about power struggles within schools and how the school's reinforcing that...couldn't possibly be the student doing the bullying's fault. There are always power struggles within schools when it comes to students, it's called being a teenager.
Students who bully other students do it because they can get away with it. And they do it at times when they're most likely to come out on top (i.e surrounded by a group of mates). The internet just means they can bully without any physical repercussions.
As far as laptops and phones in school go, I reckon the former are only slightly necessary and the latter totally unnecessary. Students should be made to hand in their phones in the morning and get them back in the afternoon. You don't need a phone at school. Here in Australia some students, who already had a laptop, got another one apparently when the government started handing them out...what the **** are you going to do with two laptops?
And don't get me started on giving out iPads...they're a luxury, not something every student needs to complete their education. If you have a laptop you don't need an iPad.
Technology is obviously something that's important to younger people's skills development, but it creates a ****ing nightmare in the classroom. Although it's possible it decreases the likelihood of a kid getting bored in class and making a ****wit out of themselves, it means teachers spend more time making sure students are doing what they're actually supposed to be doing and not ****ing around on the internet.
I have this problem in my classes, and apparently I teach adults. I teach a classes filled with Pavlovian dogs - every time they hear a tone they madly fumble for their phone as they simply must answer any message they get immediately.
(Probably should have taken this to 'What Grinds Your Gears' halfway through...)
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I guarantee you if you tried to enforce those cellphone restrictions there would be revolution before morning tea. That and they'll move on to smashing each others heads in.
Aside from the fact making students hand in their cellphones is an incredibly dire idea (even a blanket ban on them being at school in the first place would be more agreeable, but still unrealistic and dire) and another great way to not teach kids personal responsibility, the main difference with cyber bullying compared to normal bullying is it makes bullying outside the school grounds so much easier. Kids will still get verbally abused at school, it just won't be conveyed via the small screen.
The New Zealand education system and the standard of teaching is already terrible without giving teachers the wrong powers. Tuck in your shirt, have a shave, pass your dumbed down NCEA unit standards which will be heavily scaled by telling the marker what they want to hear, and most importantly, don't think. I'd hate to see them reading cellphones on top of it.
I think teachers have a terrible time of it because quite honestly, some 15-17 year olds shouldn't be at school yet still are, and some poor overworked and vastly underpaid sod has to try and force something through their skulls. Now I hear we're cutting teacher numbers, which will increase class sizes, which will make the jobs of teachers even more impossible, but there is no way blurring the line between the education and prison systems is the way to go about improving things. That will just ensure more kids will stop turning up.
From what I remember of school, any poor kid who felt for whatever reason that smacking the bullies was not a viable option (and it often wasn't), going to authorities like teachers was entirely ineffective, both because they either didn't do anything or simply because most bullies don't care about detentions and suspensions, and everyone knew the bully would just come down like hell on the poor kid.
As for giving out iPads and laptops though, um, wtf? That's a lot of money to throw towards Facebook.