“The pendulum had swung too far, as always, and now was swinging back,
and the horror of intolerance had been loosed upon the land.”
Clifford D. Simak, Time Is the Simplest Thing
(an old pendulum to one of my grandmother’s clocks/ Julie Cook/ 2023)
I can pretty much remember my high school Lit classes rather vividly…
along with my classes in Sociology, Anthropology and always my beloved history classes.
We were charged with having to read various tales such as A Brave New World, Animal Farm, The Gulag Archipelago, Cancer Ward, 1984—tales now classified as dystopian….
or what the Oxford dictionary tells us is something
“relating to or denoting an imagined state or society where there is great suffering or injustice.”
I thought authors such as Solzhenitsyn were merely recounting a past that was no longer
and that Huxley and Orwell were science fiction writers with vivid imaginations…
depressive imaginations but most vivid.
1984 seemed so far away.
Tales of gulags, soon to be big brotheresque societies, societal meltdowns all rang
of gloom and doom.
What my mind imagined to be most important was that I’d just gotten my driver’s license…
events such as graduation were still some time off—then college lay ahead…
heck, life itself lay ahead!!!
Vietnam was behind us.
Communism didn’t seem to be what it was.
The Fallout Shelter signs still hanging on the walls of the school were no longer noticed.
And the future, my future, was an oyster filled with pearls to be found…right?
The books I was having to read left me feeling uncomfortable and troubled.
I really didn’t want to imagine such a world.
I didn’t want to think about it, dwell upon it.
Not a world where my own government actually planned and plotted against me.
A government telling, nay demanding, that I do its bidding.
The government worked for me, for us, didn’t it??
Wasn’t I living in the United States for heaven’s sake??
We were in the throes of celebrating our Bicentennial.
Flag pins and all things Red, White and Blue were not only the rage but the norm.
There was a sense of pride and vast excitement.
1776 to 1976—-
the battle from tyranny and oppression to democratic freedom had
been valiantly fought and now maintained for a solid 200 years…..
It was a phenomenon that many considered to be a mere experiment–
a foolhardy foray into the realm of a working democracy.
A novelty that certainly wouldn’t, couldn’t, last and yet merrily it appeared to be
doing just that…working as well as flourishing.
Yet always in the back of my youthful mind rose questions…
Could the books I was reading actually happen?
Could such worlds, such times come to fruition during my lifetime?
Please tell me no.
Well…I think, rather sadly, that we all now know the answer to my youthful query.
I taught high school for 31 years.
I’ve been retired now for almost 12 years.
It was a period of time that witnessed mimeograph machines, carbon paper, typewriters,
grade ledgers, chalk boards, pay phones, film projectors, overhead projectors
all oddly yet interestingly disappear one by one…
all the while they morphed into other things.
Things such as xerox machines, fax machines, smart boards, mobile phones, computers,
power point presentations, smart tablets…
Technology had come into its own, especially in the world of education.
I was one of those teachers who actually replaced a hard copy grade book and calculator
with a computer and a variety of grading platforms and programs.
A teacher who went from papers and pens to a computer. A huge thing that took up an entire table.
Cables and wires all tethered to things such a modems and towers, and printers.
It was a huge learning curve for the current sitting educator.
We were straddling an expanse of time of what had been and what was to be…
and we had to hurry up to get on board as it was all advancing faster than we
could be taught to keep up.
This trip down memory lane came to the forefront of my brain this morning when I caught
an interesting article posted on the Federalist.
It’s an article about cell phone and classrooms.
Answer The Call Already: Ban Smartphones In Schools
by By: Jermey S. Adams / October 04, 2023
It made me remember the days when kids began to bring iPods and cell phones into the school.
At first we teachers were tasked with confiscating these interloping devices.
However both parent and student became incensed that we were taking up personal property.
Expensive personal property…despite it being returned by the end of the day.
One too many offenses and the parents would have to come pick up the device.
That went over like a massive stone of inconvenience.
What if there was an emergency for heaven’s sake?!
Had we not suffered through Columbine?
Did parents not have the right to be able to immediately contact their children
if the need should arise?
This was also the time that social media was on the rise.
Oddities such as Chat rooms, Myspace, texting were on the move.
iPods were ever present as kids would walk down the halls with wires
leading to their ears.
Tuned in, yet tuned out.
It was clear that this burgeoning bit of technology within schools was becoming a monster
that needed to be tamed.
But the question was how.
Eventually the idiom of if we can’t beat them, join them came into play.
The eureka thought was that we must incorporate their devices into the curriculum.
We’ll strike a live and let live coexistence.
But what of the darker side?
The sexting.
The predation.
The cyber bullying?
The blatant cheating…all at the touch of a finger.
Mr. Adams notes in his article a familiar place I readily remember…
There was a moment in the past decade when most teachers,
myself included, thought that the ubiquitous presence of cell phones made a war
against them unwinnable.
Many of us thought it more judicious to find a way to integrate the technology
into our classroom routines.
Likewise, many of us were open to discipline reform and innovation
in the way we graded our students.
But the reality of what these fashionable ideas have done to American
education is too difficult to ignore.
The pendulum can, and must, start to swing the other way.
It certainly appears that Mr. Adams’ article is most timely.
He notes that an array of studies and data now tell us that the overt use of technology,
social media, et el, is a detriment to learning rather than a boon.
I think many of us figured this out years ago.
Yet our students are now suffering due to our own frantic efforts to appease them while
striking some sort of balance.
We knew what worked and what was best yet we wanted to keep the peace.
We capitulated.
We leaned toward a kumbaya sense of equity of leveling all playing fields.
We wanted to appear sympathetic and not hurt feelings or what we falsely assumed
to be fragile egos.
Pass all, fail no one.
Advance them on regardless of whether they made the grade or not.
Failure was too painful.
Hard work was simply that, too hard.
And so I was actually very happy to read that countries such a France, Italy, Finland
and even England were now banning cell phones from schools.
As a young new teacher I can remember an older more senior teacher once
remarking that education was a pendulum.
It will swing in one direction for a time, then eventually swing back.
Be that good or bad.
I just hope we are beginning to actually swing back to a more sensible direction…
all before it’s too late in what has become our foolhardy race to a static state of
inertia.
Here’s a link to the article:
cookiecrumbstoliveby 