THE DARK SIDE OF CONVENIENCE

Back dating a little, I remember how much students using any phone in school was frowned upon. Even calculators were only used by those in higher classes and this is because they wanted students to learn the basic concepts of calculating without help from anywhere except their brains, fingers, toes and their hands to count stones or any little objects they can find. I think that was the highest they allowed and we could see the effect on how much students did well at calculating.

Today, even in primary schools, once they are asked to calculate little numbers, you see them trying to reach out to their calculators for help. This didn’t just start one day and the sad reality is that it might not end there. Today, most people are beginning to normalize cheating in the examination hall and you hear them say things like, ”what can’t enter your brain will enter the exam hall”. At first when I heard that slogan I laughed because it was funny but then, on the other hand it was sad.

This act did not just started happening today, it took years of most people normalizing that it’s fine to ask for help when something is too hard even in the examination hall. So these days, people don’t work hard anymore but they still want to get the good grades that those who work really hard for should get. All they do is look for those scholars who have burnt the midnight candles and sit close to them just to disturb them for answers or they go into the examination hall with their phones or smart gadgets.

Personally, I know I will be a very strict lecturer when it comes to examination malpractice because I have never liked the idea before and that was all thanks to the punishment I got because of someone trying to cheat back when I was in primary school. It was obvious that, that class mate of mine never did his assignments and even when he did them, it must have been that his elder ones or his parents helped him. Can you imagine someone in primary school cheating?! Well, I’m very sure today it is even more rampant sadly.

Allowing the use of phones in the university is something that is I can’t frown at because students need these phones to do different things in class, both important and unnecessary things but they do need the phone. But I don’t see any reason why a primary school child or even a secondary school student will have their phones with them in class. And even if they need the phone for communication reasons, there should be a place where they can keep it beside their bags so if they need it urgently they can go there to get it.

Allowing students to use their phones as early as primary school will only expose them faster to the world that is coming at them. The truth is, we can’t run away from the effect of the internet, the least we can do is control its effect. Parents and teachers should teach their students properly so they don’t have the need to seek information elsewhere all the time. Because, I have come to realize that majority of those who use phones in class, tests and even in the examination hall is due to the fact that they have not been properly taught and they lack the confidence to even attempt any questions on their own.

And knowing they can easily get an answer most times just by asking google, they quickly want to opt for that option rather than going through so much stress and also rather than failing. In a long run, if this continues, we will keep producing the worst graduates except for those who are naturally good at putting in the work and unfortunately, by default, not everyone is ready to put in the work when they know there is already an easy way out. The effect will be felt even more in the generations to come if we don’t figure out a way to stop it.

With proper training both from homes and in our primary and secondary schools, I believe that students won’t always want to reach out to their phones the moment they find any question hard. They will always want to try their best and if they fail, they will be more happy to learn and make sure they do better. The problem we are having now is that, in our society today, it’s looks like it is prohibited to fail, so instead of failing, most people just choose to cheat instead.

When anyone has this mind, they will never see anything wrong with examination malpractice. They just don’t want to fail so if it means to cheat, then they will go for it. That is a sick mindset and it is contaminating the system even faster than we can imagine, which is not a good thing at all.

This is my response to the Hivelearners topic on ”NO PHONES ALLOWED”. Thanks for reading through. ❤️