PROOF THAT A SMARTPHONE BANCAN WORK
...and that it’s better for schools, children AND families!
THESE are the parents and teachers who offer living proof that smartphone age limits for children DO work – and are good for children.
Just eight days since staff and parents of pupils at Co. Kerry’s Blennerville National School agreed to a home and school ban on smartphones and similar devices, the experiment has been hailed as a huge success by all involved. Parents have seen their children’s performance and moods improve, with many adding that their youngsters have been showing a renewed interest in family time, outside activities, sport or communal games.
The experiment’s success is a strong vindication of the Irish Daily Mail’s campaign for a minimum age for smartphone ownership.
And it is a hammer-blow to the tech industry apologists and political hand-wringers who have spent months claiming such measures are unnecessary or unworkable. A
parent of one schoolgirl said: ‘I have seen a huge change. She’s interested in doing family things with us again and not being alone with that screen.’
And principal Terry O’Sullivan said: ‘The point is not to punish children but to protect them and let them have a childhood.’
In February a survey revealed how 75.7% of people are in favour of young people under the age of 14 being banned from having smartphones. Only 19.8% were against it and 4.5% were unsure in the survey by TheJournal.ie.
A similar poll by RTÉ’s Claire Byrne Live indicated 56% of the public think the Government should ban young people from using smartphones until they are teenagers.
Meanwhile, an Irish Daily Mail/Ireland Thinks poll, published in January, showed 69% of people support a smartphone ban for under-16s, with 30% against and 1% having no opinion.
And a petition signed by more than 2,000 readers of this newspaper calling for an age restriction to be introduced on smartphones was handed over to embattled Communication Minister Denis Naughten.
However, last month, a Government-led forum on digital safety led by Mr Naughten failed to address the concerns of parents. Instead the forum allowed tech giants such as Facebook and Google to have their say – and the safety concerns of parents across Ireland were ignored. Mr Naughten himself sneered that proposing age limits on smartphones was akin to suggesting a ban on pens.
However, growing numbers of teachers and doctors have since spoken up to say that smartphones are causing appalling damage to the young people they see every day.
After a string of difficulties caused by smartphones, teachers at Blennerville school, outside Tralee, met parents last week to tackle the issue, and they decided to ban smartphones and other online devices. The school, which has 16 teachers and 182 pupils, faced the growing problems of children being online and excessive use of smartphones during and after school. Children were not engaging in outside activities, and the problem came to a head when a Snapchat group created by sixth-class pupils featured ‘highly inappropriate language’, which was leading to children feeling isolated and bullied at the primary school. Blennerville has now started an 11-week digital detox programme at school and at home.
Principal Mr O’Sullivan yesterday said the ‘inappropriate material’ that had been circulated among pupils aged 11 and 12 had led to ‘fractured friendships’, so he and his staff decided to act in consultation with parents. He called a mandatory meeting for parents last week.
Mr O’Sullivan said: ‘All of our efforts and the point of the meeting last week was to protect the children, and most importantly protect their emotional well-being. We hear a lot of the pressures that children now face, and these groups created online through smart devices don’t help.
‘We feel strongly here that primary school children are not ready emotionally to be able to deal with these messaging apps and groups.’
At the meeting, the principal told parents why, from the school’s perspective, a smartphone ban in the home would address their concerns.
Parents then had their say before attendees agreed to draw up an action plan for a smartphone ban for the next 11 weeks. The first week has already seen dramatic results.
Mr O’Sullivan said: ‘The parents... were struggling with all these issues at home, but when we came together as a school community, then we were able to make decisions together.’
Yesterday, parents applauded Mr O’Sullivan and his staff for bringing to light the ‘worrying’ online chats their children had been having.
Parent Mary Ryan O’Sullivan, a mother of two, said: ‘The impact these messages were having shocked us all.
‘The popularity of social networking has increased rapidly in the past ten years. It’s nearly a given that kids would have access to a phone, and unfortunately holding these devices in your hand is like holding a computer in your hand.
‘I would strongly encourage other parents to take this journey. Kids very quickly find other things to do like play the guitar or kicking a ball. This is serious, and it can have a very negative impact on children.’
Parent Andie Latchford-Healy, whose daughter is in sixth class, said she has seen a great improvement in her child’s attitude to normal activities such as playing outside.
And in relation to the ban’s effect on her daughter, she said: ‘Seven days later I have seen a huge change and she has been spending a lot of time with us. She’s interested in doing family things with us again and not being alone with that screen.
‘I fully support the Irish Daily Mail campaign. A child should be at least
14 or 15 before a child owns a smartphone; it depends how emotionally mature the child is.
‘It’s not an easy road to take as a parent but we are protecting our children’s future here.’
Mr O’Sullivan said: ‘We are a week into the pilot and parents have rang me to say they have seen big changes in their children. Many parents saw their children back playing board games last weekend, out kicking a football and simply sitting next to their mother on the sofa and having a chat.
‘The point of this pilot is not to punish children but to protect them and let them have a childhood.’ He added: ‘As a board of management, we said we had to be proactive on this given the content of the messages and the growing problems that kept occurring, and we are not the only school encountering this. The only way we felt that we could make a stance on this was to invite all the parents of sixth class into the school here. What was important, I suppose, is that we sent the parents a note to say it was mandatory to attend.’
They won the praise of Ryan Tubridy, who said the school and parents have been ‘brilliant’ in banning smartphones. On his RTÉ Radio show yesterday, he said: ‘They [the school and parents] are a test case in how to turn around to kids and say, “You are not getting one, not going to happen.” Hats off to Terry O’Sullivan, all the teachers, and all the parents and let’s hope that sense prevails around the country.’
CONGRATULATIONS to school principal Terry O’Sullivan, the board of management, and the parents of Blennerville National School for taking the bull by the horns and introducing a ban on smartphones outside school hours. From speaking to teachers, we know only too well in this newspaper the problems that they face when dealing with the fall-out from smartphone use.
But to have the courage and the foresight to actually summon parents to a mandatory meeting and persuade them to take a radical step like this is nothing short of exemplary.
Indeed, it illustrates the ultimate point of education: that it is not simply to teach children how to perfect their Irish, or how to interpret poetry, but rather that it involves something much more than that. That its goal is to look after the welfare of children in a way that will improve their lives. The action taken by Blennerville in relation to smartphone use only serves to reinforce this aim.
For it is very clear when you talk to the parents that this approach is making everybody’s life better. Children are spending more time in the company of their families, playing games, talking, interacting on a normal human level. It is absolute proof, indeed, that the apologists for the tech industry are wrong.
First of all, when this issue was raised as a concern, they said that there was no problem, a viewpoint that has been comprehensively demolished in recent months. Then, with a grudging acknowledgement that perhaps there was an issue that required attention, they still shrugged their shoulders, declaring that nothing could be done, that it was impossible to turn back the tide.
Well, now we have the living proof that something can be done about smartphones, that parents and teachers are not powerless in the face of the Apples and Facebooks of this world.
Indeed, here is precisely the proof we needed that the power lies in our hands, that it is up to us to decide how we want society to operate so that everyone benefits.
In the same way as the smoking ban provoked all kind of negativity when it was first mooted, so too with smartphones. So those who have been opposing regulation need to recognise that they were wrong.
It’s up to other parents to now pick up the baton and make this happen in their schools too.
It’s time to stop kowtowing to the tech industry and do what’s right and what’s necessary to make lives better.