Phoning It In
I am by no means pro cell phones in class, but the idea that banning cell phones in class is going to lead to massive gains in student learning overestates how much learning happens in those 60 to 90 minutes vs. the rest of the day. It's a much deeper problem than phones.
— John Warner (@biblioracle) June 3, 2024
John Warner is a fantastic writer which is good, because he focuses on the teaching of writing. He’s one of those thinkers and writers that makes me regret not going the composition rhetoric route.
This comment is exactly right. Phones are a symptom of a poor pedagogy, not the cause of one. Phones are a distraction simply because they have been defined as one by the instructor or by the culture of instruction that we currently have. I see this issue as one that posits authority against appropriateness - one communicates an arbitrary world of power and powerlessness; the other a world structured rhetorically that always has to be articulated and re-articulated to survive, thrive, or change.
Many things that are a part of the “real world” are considered a distraction from learning and teaching simply because they are new, or the instructors haven’t figured out how to incorporate them into the classroom. The real problem with phones is how many instructors phone it in on this question.
I don’t think many classroom policies rely on rhetorical standards for their justification - instead, they rely on very bad legal metaphors: “The Syllabus is a contract;” “I employ contract grading, sign here.” These same people will also support contradictory ideas such as, “My classroom is a community where diversity is respected.” I would hope that teachers would act and sound different than a typical HOA, but I think this is the discourse.
Communities are constituted by the members, not by property rights, or contracts for goods and services (sad that people do not see that this is what contract grading strongly defines teaching as) so it requires rhetorical engagement. That means the members of the class must discuss what is appropriate and inappropriate and why, and most importantly they must be allowed to return to it to modify it as time passes. The situation in the class will change over time and must be adjudicated. This cannot be ignored.
Furthermore, metaphors in the classroom must be changed beyond the legal metaphor for the syllabus/class policies. There is a distinction that is often used in teaching about how such-and-such behavior, such as being habitually late, will “not be accepted by an employer” or “Isn’t accepted out in the real world.” This “real world/classroom” distinction can be thought of as an argumentative pair, a strategy of arguing that was identified and theorized by Chaim Perelman and Lucie Olbrects-Tyteca in their book The New Rhetoric: A Treatise on Argumentation. You pair two terms with one another, citing one as the “appearance” and the other as the “reality.” The rhetorical aspect comes from identifying the term you don’t want the audience to buy into as the way “things seem to be,” then you swoop in with the reality of the situation, making it more convincing because it is placed next to another proposition in a way to where it feels like it is dissolving it.
Teachers often approach students and say that seems good what they are doing, but in the “real world,” employers, bosses, etc, won’t put up with that sort of quality of work. Ironically, they also use it to ban things, like mobile phones, because the classroom is a place that is outside of “real world” activities, designed to focus, be sacred, and be clean in some way. Removing “distracting” things from the outside is often thought of through a metaphor of disinfecting the classroom as if what is about to happen is as serious as a surgical procedure. I really value class time; I love teaching. However, I do not think it has this level of acute importance. It is important in the same way habits do, a schedule, or a way you conduct your days to live a meaningful and valuable life.
What needs to change is a massive shift in metaphor. Perhaps the classroom is a place where we bring in “real world” problems, moments, stories, etc and analyze them for clues on what options we have in terms of reaction/behavior? Maybe the classroom is where we learn how to address and use technology in everyday life when we have an honest choice to put the phone down? Maybe the classroom is meant to be where we form arguments and advocacy as to why the world should be structured differently than what we see daily?
The mobile phone issue is a question of appropriateness so it is a rhetorical problem. Is it appropriate to have a mobile phone out during a lecture or during a class? The only reasonable answer I can think of is “sometimes.” Any other answer seems to diminish agency, one of the things I think we are trying to teach in schooling of every level, as well as creating disconnects between education and everyday life.
No wonder people feel reading is a chore that they don’t need to do; no wonder people are starting to believe more and more that universities are indoctrination centers where ideology is forced onto people. All of this is connected through arbitrary uses of authority by the teacher that phone use is merely a symptom. Appropriateness is always being determined and pushed on by everyone. Why isn’t that a part of the classroom? Why is it appropriate to back up an argument with evidence? Why is it appropriate to show your work in math? All of these things are the best way to think of the function of school, the purpose of a classroom, and the role of education in society. Education is society, and the problems we see in holding together a society that is enjoyable and worth participating in, worth defending, can be traced back to authority versus appropriateness.