The richer of the two districts I sub in, the one with all the amazing technology in all its classrooms, is experiencing serious technological problems: students use technology to cheat. I know this district is not alone. Last Friday was the end of the the first semester and I took a job at the high school. The job turned out to be assisting in a math class where they were taking an end-of-semester exam. The regular math teacher told me my job would be to circulate about the classroom as the students took the test. He would deal with the test protocol. I was to stay on my feet for two two-hour periods, watching for students who might pull out their cell phones, take pictures of the test, and text the photos to their classmates who had not yet taken the exam. He told me this bad behavior had happened three times the day before.
When the students arrived, the teacher informed the class that three students had been sent to the office the previous day for cell phone cheating and had received a zero on the exam. He went on to say that no cell phones should be seen at all for the entire exam period. Those who took out their phones at any time would be sent to the office for disciplinary action. He didn't bother to introduce me to the students in the first exam period, so before the second session started, I jumped up and introduced myself. I felt it polite for students to at least to know the name of the person who was going to be spying and ratting on them.
The teacher rose from his computer at the front of the room a couple of times to help those who had trouble launching the computer part of the exam. The rest of the time he did not get up from his chair in front of his computer screen: surfing the web perhaps? In the two testing sessions, the teacher threw out a total of six students, sending them to the office for reasons that were unclear to me. He yelled at them from the front of the room to get out, saying that he had had it with them. They must had done something to annoy him other than taking out their cell phones. I was on the job after all.
Both districts where I sub, beginning in kindergarten, have a test protocol such that students are trained to put up folders to block the student next to them from being able to see their test. I guess the presumption is that everybody cheats, even in kinder. Students in all grades often sit at tables nowadays. Individual student desks, which offered a little privacy and autonomy, are becoming a thing of the past.
Students finished their math exams at different rates, some being done in 30 minutes and some taking the entire two hours. Several who finished before the allotted time, handed in their tests and sneakily took out their cell phones -- not to cheat, just to do what we all do with our cell phones. I quickly made a judgement call and decided to go up to the students and quietly remind them of what happened yesterday and that they should put their phones away. I then smiled and said, "Why don't you just take out a book from your backpack to read?" That remark prompted all but one to look at me as if I were crazy, but they did all politely put their phones away. (Geez! and here I thought students still read books in their free moments.)
I was amazed that the students who took out their phones were so good at hiding the fact. The regular teacher, glued to his chair and his computer, would never have noticed from his vantage point that they had phones out even if he did look up from the front of the classroom. It became clear to me how easily cell phone cameras could be used to cheat if a teacher did not spend the test period walking around the classroom.
I was amazed that the students who took out their phones were so good at hiding the fact. The regular teacher, glued to his chair and his computer, would never have noticed from his vantage point that they had phones out even if he did look up from the front of the classroom. It became clear to me how easily cell phone cameras could be used to cheat if a teacher did not spend the test period walking around the classroom.
Students today bring cell phones to school, be they in elementary, middle, or high school. In 2006, New York City banned students from bringing cell phones to school, and parents sued (and lost), arguing that their children's safety was at stake. The policy in most schools across the country is that students are not to use phones in class, but of course students do anyway. Teachers threaten to take phones away if they see them out in class, but often when you confront students they have a ready reason for why their phone is out: Mom just sent them a text and they have to call her immediately; or Dad was supposed to drop off the lunch box that was forgotten on the kitchen table and the office has not called to tell them it arrived. Do you really expect them to go without lunch? Truth is, kids are just as addicted to their phones are we adults are.
I had my own personal wake up moment with regard to cell phone use in a classroom several months back in the same school district. I was subbing in a middle school math class and I learned that a certain boy went to the principal after class to complain that I was too strict: strict meaning that I did not let the class deviate from the regular teacher's plan for the period. This student had become very defiant so I told him to sit in the hallway. When this child got home, his parents called the principal saying that their son had used his cell phone to tape me and I could be heard swearing at the students in the class. The principal called me into his office the next day, as I was subbing in the building again, and told me what had happened. I asked him whether he had heard the tape of me swearing and he said no, but the parents were going to bring in the phone and play him the recording tomorrow. He asked if I had sworn at the students. I said of course not, and he said, "Well, they have you on tape and I will meet with you after I meet with the parents." I never heard back from this jerk, I mean principal, and I don't chose to sub in this school anymore.
I do not presume to know the answer to the problem of cell phones in the classroom. I remember sitting in church in the front row, years back, and my phone went off during the sermon (the only ringing oration I remember!). It rang several times before I could turn if off. Last month at Lincoln Center, a man's phone went off during a performance of the New York Philharmonic and the conductor stopped the concert.
Cell phones are here to stay and they are both wonderful and terrible, like the many other technological devices that fill up our days. I hate the idea that if students are not watched at every moment during an exam they will cheat. There will always be students who lie because they do not get to do what they want in school. The realization that students may be recording you in the classroom is a bit sobering, however, it is probably good to know it could be happening to you at anytime.
Good thing I don't swear at the students I teach, but as I walked around the classroom that day for four hours, I did have my Kindle in my hands reading the New Yorker. When the battery went dead on the Kindle, I took out my cell phone to read a book as I continued looking for cheaters. A good teacher can multi- task because she has those eyes in the back of her head. Luckily, the regular teacher did not send me to the office for taking out my cell phone. I guess he did not want to do my job. He did use a couple swear words though that day so I hope no one got him on tape or he might have been in for some disciplinary action from the office himself.
No comments:
Post a Comment