Laughs in GameBoy.
Seriously, you have to be elder gen x or older to exist in a time where handheld consoles of some flavor were not available. And there’s always been other forms of entertainment, be it passing notes, talking, or daydreaming.
Also, if your argument is "gameboy existed". People just did not use it as much. Today smartphone usage in class is rampant. Also gameboy games were not anywhere near as addicting as games and social media are today.
Have you never played Tetris? Any Gameboy game where you have to level up (like Final Fantasy) will also be a severe temptation as you have something productive to do while the teacher yammers about stuff you either already know, has nothing to do with you (e.g. talking to another student), or don't care about (like really I do not care about the difference between "predicate nominative" and "subject complement").
Also the original Game Boy was a bit too big to bring into a class and not get caught, but Game Boy Advance SP was perfect.
No, but we can take the electronic device and log it into the office so that a parent has to come retrieve it. And if I happen to forget a couple of days and only manage to log it in on Friday so that they don’t get it over the weekend, well, I’m a forgetful chap.
That threat alone, not having a phone over the weekend eliminates 90% of phone issues in my classroom.
None of this is new. Children being distracted in classrooms is nothing new. If there's children, there's socializing, playing games, and ignoring adults for the much more interesting other children.'
Cell phones are just the new boogyman, like CD players and walkmen and gameboys etc. were back in the day.
Well, how are teachers supposed to enforce a ban on smartphones, then?
Gameboys just weren't very common. I grew up in a pretty well off area, and I only knew a couple of people with them.
Whereas, I wouldn't be surprised if more than 90% of teens have smart phones.
Hell, parents call their kids in class just to chat.
> When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."
> Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community.
> Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.
C'mon man.
Gameboy was risky in class (never saw anyone do that), but several of us did bring our NDS to assemblies and used the wireless chat feature.
73M children, 118M gameboys.
The one where I played NES emulator on the lab computer and blockdude on the ti83.
There is something to be said for focus.