Mobile Technology in the Classroom

This has always been my experience with mobile technology in the classroom. It has always been a 'no phone allowed' policy - after all, if you're looking at your phone you're not paying attention to the teacher.

I haven't ever used mobile technology in the classroom but have, however, used it outside of the classroom to enhance the learning experience.

I had a previous lecturer who had Twitter and encouraged us to follow him. Although he was using Twitter in a personal capacity, he would retweet and post links to relevant legal news and developments. If he found an interesting article that related to a lecture he would state that it was for his class to read. He even began to use Audio files to record mini-lectures so that we would be informed on the class before arriving.

He was young for a lecturer (under 30!) and maybe this had something to do with it, but he was the only one ever to use mobile technology in this way and I really benefited from it.

Using mobile technology in the classroom is clearly a developing area, the investments in iPads made by schools are unbelievable. However, as a person who has only been teaching for a couple of weeks, I already feel the frustration and annoyance at seeing a student looking at their phone and start texting while I am speaking. I find it infuriating, rude and disrespectful.  So, now, being the other side of the classroom I can completely understand the need for a no-phone policy and I am struggling to think of a situation where I would ever permit a class of 16 year olds to get out their phones to improve their learning - because as far as I can see at the moment, it's just another means to distract them from their boring class.