How school cellphone bans are playing out in the country’s classrooms this fall

New and strengthened policies restricting students’ use of cellphones swept across Canada as a new school year got underway this fall. 

Now, about a month into the term, students and educators tell CBC News what they’re experiencing in the classroom — from little change to drastic differences.

Ishaal Ali, Grade 12

Students are being more careful about when they’re using their phones and stashing them inside pockets or backpacks instead of putting them on their desks, like they did before, said Ishaal Ali, a Grade 12 student in Ottawa.

In April, Ontario enacted more specific guidelines for the fall to underline restrictions first introduced in 2019.

“There’s a lot less phone usage in class,” she said, adding that “certain apps are blocked, so you can’t access them without data anyway.”

Even prior to this fall, however, Ali said she found it was largely younger peers glued to their phones, since senior students better understand the value of paying attention and fully participating in class.

“That was just a part of learning how to self-regulate and learning that responsibility of ‘the phone or my grades,'” she said.

Senior grades should have more leeway, with tougher restrictions reserved for guiding middle schoolers and those in grades 9 and 10, “who are just sort of learning how to navigate these new high school waters,” Ali said.

Liam Sache, Grade 9

Cellphone use has been rampant in recent years, Grade 9 student Liam Sache said, adding it was normal for bored students to text friends or scroll through social media in class amid inconsistent rules from instructor to instructor.

“Teachers who are more loosey-goosey about it, they tend to have a less productive class,” the Corner Brook, N.L., teen said. “I had this teacher … she’d take our phones [away during class time]. And that’s probably the best I’d ever done in a math class.”

Staff at his school began drafting a cellphone policy last year and unveiled it this fall. It’s been deemed so successful that the administration is speeding up the rollout. Originally planned for the next few years, it will be fully implemented by November.

The policy’s success has also garnered interest from other schools, as well as Newfoundland and Labrador’s Department of Education, which is currently mulling province-wide restrictions for its older students.

“If you have your phone out, there’s gonna be this consequence…. Nobody wants to have their phone taken away for a month or even the whole day,” Sache said.

“I don’t fully agree with the super harsh restrictions, even though they may be needed. But productivity skyrocketing? Absolutely.” 

Robin Blanchard, math teacher

Robin Blanchard, the mathematics department head at Sache’s school, didn’t allow phones before the official policy took effect, but she admits sometimes having difficulty enforcing restrictions. With a well-communicated, admin-supported official policy in place, she said she noticed big changes the last few weeks.

No more distracted students have been sneaking onto Snapchat under their desk, for example, or messaging friends to schedule hallway or restroom meet-ups while class is in session.

“I’m noticing that students are much more on task … they’re very much more engaged in lessons,” Blanchard said. “My students have been really compliant.”

Changes have also extended to other places, like the cafeteria at lunch, she said. “I’m seeing a lot more [students] just being social with one another face-to-face, instead of online.”

Atlas, Grade 11  

So far this year, Winnipeg Grade 11 student Atlas hasn’t seen a massive shift at school — just a few more kids keeping phones in backpacks rather than out — because teachers haven’t really changed their classroom routines from before a new provincial policy began in September. CBC News has agreed to withhold Atlas’s surname over safety concerns.

Even before the new policy, few students would be on their phones when teachers were actively teaching, Atlas said. If students choose to use their phones during classroom periods dedicated to working or completing their assignments, “that’s up to them,” and they must then finish their work at home.

Uniform cellphone restrictions ignore how vital cellphones are for many students every day, according to the teen, who bristles at suggestions that kids just leave them at home.

For example, their school relies heavily on a platform called Edsby. It’s how students receive and submit some assignments, communicate with teachers about their classes or extracurriculars like sports teams, yearbook or band, view schedules and more. Many students access the platform via a cellphone app because they lack dedicated laptop computers.

“The only thing we have is our phones,” Atlas said. “If you were to play it by the rule of ‘You can’t touch your phone while you’re in class at all,’ you might not be able to access any of that.”

While some restrictions are understandable — privacy and consent rules are well established in acceptable use of technology policies, for example — the teen thinks generic bans will leave schools stuck in the past.

“Blanket solutions aren’t going to get us very far. If we want to be able to make these things better for future generations, why don’t we try to learn and see what does work?” they said.

Jason Bradshaw, science teacher

At the secondary level in Ontario, schools have long maintained and enforced cellphone use at a teacher’s discretion, said science teacher Jason Bradshaw.

So the main difference the Brampton, Ont., teacher has seen this fall is simply that students and families know exactly what to expect, given all the chatter sparked by so many education ministries across Canada enacting policies in a short period.

He said that personally, he hasn’t struggled to enforce restrictions but that fellow teachers who face resistance in the classroom require support from both school leadership and parents.

“No matter what I say as a teacher, it’s not going to be effective if parents are giving a different message at home,” Bradshaw said, adding that his most frequent cellphone interruptions are parents or family members calling students.

Cellphones are powerful computers that can be leveraged for learning — and some opportunities would be impossible otherwise given a shortage of devices for students — but their connection to cyberbullying, overuse of social media and poor mental health for teens can make them dangerous as well, Bradshaw said. A cellphone ban alone will not solve these issues.

“I have no doubt that there are schools, communities and classrooms where cellphones have done a lot of harm, and we do need to enforce policies that help teachers with that, but … there’s so much more that we need to do. That’s just scratching the surface of what young people deserve.”

Annie Ohana, social studies teacher

In British Columbia, more regulation over cellphone use is being welcomed, since many teachers have noticed students increasingly distracted by their devices, said Annie Ohana, who teaches social justice, law and Indigenous studies in high school.

Teachers must have autonomy to decide just how cellphones can be used in their respective classrooms, the Surrey, B.C., teacher said.

Her students now slide their phones into a numbered caddy when they’re not needed for that day’s lesson. Another day, however, she might ask them to use their phones to research a current event or participate in a Kahoot quiz she’s built.

Scrolling social media sites for personal reasons, however, is a no-go.

“Different teachers can make their own decisions that work for them. Where there are exceptionalities — whether that’s medical ones or specific situations that are ongoing — we will take note of that,” Ohana said.

“I haven’t seen any teacher face pushback for being more strict. I think students do understand, and teachers do a good job explaining why the cellphone might not be needed.”