Personal Electronics should be allowed in the classroom

Refutations to my arguements Efficient -fast writing 1. Electronics allow plagiarism. 2. You can type it on the school computers or at home. This would prevent a lot of cheating. Enhances learning 1. Waldorf (68% vs. 94% going to college rate) 2. While our opponents talk about small groups of people getting a better education, we have a study from the Economist that shows that when millions of students were given a laptop, education remains dismal. 13% passed standards on math and 30% in reading. Emergencies 1. When all the students in one area are calling, this would jam the phone line. This proves that phones are not useful in emergencies. 2. Emergencies occur very rarely. The risk of cheating and distractions far outweighs the chance that a student would need to call his parents in an emergency. 3. Authorities and the school office should be in charge of emergencies. The school office can use their phone to call parents one by one. This way, lines will not jam up, and would eliminate the risk of cheating. Help Learn 1. Cheating on voc/spelling/comp. 2. Distractions. According to IDC 2011 report, kindles captured 48% of the eReader market. According to ehow. com, kindles can store music. The last thing we need is students listening to music in class from eReaders. keeps children in college -save money on textbooks via eReaders 1. In this debate, we are not talking about colleges. We should focus on k-12 education because everyone knows college students are very mature and have less of a problem with electronic cheating or distraction. 2. You won’t need to buy the textbook, school provided. Her refutations to my arguements1. CHEATINGA. Teenagers use cell phones to cheat. Before there were cell phones (and even after cell phones became popular), students have found various ways to cheat including but not limited to asking their peers for information; copying off a neighbor's work; creating a cheat sheet; etc. We will never fully inhibit cheating, however it can be combatted through more attentative teachers, particularly during testing. Cell phones may also be prohibited during testing times only. Perhaps the teacher can collect them before the beginning of class and return them at the end during exam days. If you do not believe this provides enough security, keep in mind that mobile phone jammers can be utilized during testing. This device is an instrument used to prevent cell phonesfrom receiving signals. When used, the jammer effectively disables cellular phones. These devices can be used in practically any location [1]. According to time magazine, 57% of kids cheat without using electronics but 73% cheat using electronics. Clearly there is a huge difference ad that makes Danille's refutation invalid. Also, many kids have their own networks like 3G that block cell phone jammers. B. A lot of students admit to"seriously cheating on a written work," primarily through plagirarism from the internet. I don't see what this has to do with cell phones considering the students are referring to cheating via the internet. Presumably a student could not plagiarize blatantly in the classroom insofar as copying entire walls of text for a paper without being noticed by the teacher, especially on a cell phone. The issue of plagiarism goes beyond the classroom. You might as well say students should not be allowed to use personal electronics outside of the classroom which is absurd. Regardless, like cell phone jammers there are also programs and software that prohibit one from browsing all or particular websites [2] which can be utilized during testing. Students can go on websites that have the essay, copy it and paste into an essay reworder and copy that essay as their own. It is that simple. Again I would like to bring up the 3G netwrorks that use their own networks which blocks and jammers. The programs that prohibit the children to see those websites are on the schools network not the users 3G network. 2. DOWNGRADING EDUCATIONA. Con quotes a parent saying they don't believe in technology in the classroom. That's their personal opinion, not even an "expert" opinion. I have a different personal opinion. Big deal. A personal opinion by an engineer who works at a highly valued company matters. B. Waldorf schools don't utilize technology, and the students are very successful. The New York Times article that Con references admits that there is no clear evidence as to whether or not students are successful specifically due to not using technology in the classroom. In fact there are a plethora of other reasons why Waldorf students are probably successful. Many Waldorf students come from families that value education highly enough to seek out a selective private school, and usually have the means to pay for it. This means they come from an environment that highly values education and thus fosters an environment that promotes education not only inside the classroom but the home. Second, Waldorf schools utilize very specific teaching methods, so there's no way to discern whether or not the students' success is because of specialized teaching or a lack of technology. Also, FYI the figures reported by Waldorf about their graduation rate and other successes comes from an "affiliated group," so that research is to be taken with a grain of salt as it would obviously be inclined to portray Waldorf in a positive light considering the affiliation. The article states that the graduation rate in normal schools with electronics was 68% and in waldorf it is 94%. this increase was caused just because of the hands on learning. C. Even though computers were given to children in Peru, they were not particularly successful. Quite obviously kids in South America grow up in a completely different environment, and those variables will surely impact the way they perform on standardized testing (which by the way has proven to be an unreliable indicator of intelligence and even measuring acquired knowledge). Furthermore, equipping children with technology alone is not a way to assure educational success. Instead I will argue that permitting technology in the classroom coupled with effective teaching methods can certainly be beneficial. The technology given to the Peru students was the same as the technology as the one given in America to make the study most accurate.