Banning smartphones because of distracting apps is equivalent to banning guitars because of heavy metal music.
It's the content, not the tool.
Schools should be teaching kids how to use these tools to create content; not just passively consume.
It's the content, not the tool.
Schools should be teaching kids how to use these tools to create content; not just passively consume.
Former teacher here: I taught open project classes, one class with old school desktop computers and one with iPads. The difference between the two techs was immense.
Desktops are made for productivity. You have a mouse, a keyboard. It's easy to type weird characters, copy/paste, save, use office suite, etc. Yeah, you know that. You're HN.
Ipads are made for consumerism. They lack a good typing device (I admit this specific point is more opinion), menus for more complex tasks are not so easy to use. With an iPads (or a smartphone) you typically scroll, scroll, scroll. Simply saving text students wrote on ipads was such a tedious task for them. I feel most smartphones fall in this category, and as such, I think they have no place in the classroom.
Internet in the classroom? Please more. Internet usable only through touchscreen? Never ever.
For other productive tasks like music creation or digital drawing, where text is far less important than it is in programming, writing documents, using a spreadsheet, etc, the iPad is arguably superior to the traditional desktop setup.
My dad did that with one of my brothers. He ended up building his own electric guitar in shop class. He learned how to play it on the sly when dad wasn't around. Now he has a room full of guitars and teaches kids the evils of Simon and Garfunkel.
What's the point of a semester long instruction in algebra or geometry still filled (mostly) with rote memorization of methods and formulas when those methods and formulas are available ubiquitously at the touch of a button. Schools see smartphones as an existential threat and rather than try to adapt their model of instruction to the tools that we all now have, they're attempting to ban them outright. I only see this leading to resentment and anger from students who are accustomed to instant, easy access to information.
To directly answer GP's question:
I took a differential equations class last semester, where the easy part of quite a few problems was to solve a quadratic equation. And it was easy, because my algebra classes had correctly required me to practice that skill (and memorize the quadratic formula).
So, you say, I'm never going to take differential equations. And you very well might not. I have two responses to that:
1) That's true, you might not, but the guy sitting next to you will, and he doesn't even know it yet. If you were allowed to opt out of that subject, you both would, and he wouldn't even have a chance to make up for it later.
2) There are plenty of other subjects where the easy part is an algebra concept, and it's only easy because you practiced it years before.
Many "formulas" are easy to read but hard to apply effectively.