Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1223 - The Data Around School Mobile Phone Bans is Mind-Blowing

Transcript

#1223 - The Data Around School Mobile Phone Bans is Mind-Blowing · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: A doctor's desk with a difference. Today, rather than looking
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: at recent scientific research, We're going to have a look
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: at a poll that is analyzing shocking new data trends
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  Speaker 1: since the mobile phone ban came in around about a
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: year ago. Today, welcome to the Happy Families Podcast, Real
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: parenting solutions every day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: We are Justin and Kylie Coulson. Kylie, your initial thoughts
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: when the phone ban came in? Were you like in schools?
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Were you for it? Were you against it? What were
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: you hearing? What was the general vibe?
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  Speaker 2: Totally for it, but I didn't hold much hope that
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  Speaker 2: it would make a huge difference.
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  Speaker 1: So Grace Grace was the Education minister in Queensland when
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  Speaker 1: Rebecca Sparrow, myself, Madonna King and a bunch of others
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  Speaker 1: wrote an open letter and said, you said that you've
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: done some community consultation and we're not going to ban
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  Speaker 1: phones in schools. You haven't consulted and you need to
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  Speaker 1: ban them. And so we really put some pressure on,
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  Speaker 1: got a lot of people behind it and there was
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  Speaker 1: a backflip. There was a turnaround and phones were banned.
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  Speaker 1: Let me share this with you. This is from a
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  Speaker 1: news article that appeared mid feb I'm a little bit
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  Speaker 1: behind the times here because there's been so much else
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  Speaker 1: going on for us to talk about, but this one
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  Speaker 1: needs to be emphasized. This is from news dot com
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  Speaker 1: dot IU. Students across the country less distracted since mobile
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  Speaker 1: phones were banned in classrooms, new research shows. A survey
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  Speaker 1: from the New South Wales Department of Education revealed eighty
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  Speaker 1: seven percent of students were less distracted in the classroom
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  Speaker 1: since mobile phones were banned a year ago. There's more.
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  Speaker 1: I know, I know you want to say something, but
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  Speaker 1: there's more. The study, which surveyed the thousand public school principles,
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  Speaker 1: showed eighty one percent of students have seen improved learning.
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  Speaker 1: And the last thing, I know, you're on the edge
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  Speaker 1: of your seat. I love doing this. I'm I'm so sorry.
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  Speaker 1: Last thing, I've got to highlight this because this is big.
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  Speaker 1: Out of South Australia, there's been a sixty three percent
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  Speaker 1: decline in critical incidents involving social media and a fifty
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  Speaker 1: four percent reduction in behavioral issues, according to Department for
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  Speaker 1: Education of South Australia's survey data. Okay, I've said everything
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  Speaker 1: I needed to say, Are you sure? Yeah, yeah, what
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  Speaker 1: were you going to say?
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  Speaker 2: Tho's just they're massive numbers, right, massive numbers. We're not
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  Speaker 2: talking about, you know, a handful of percentages here. This
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  Speaker 2: is nearly one hundred percent. Really like eighty seven percent. Legit,
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  Speaker 2: that's huge. So I predicted that this would happen. I
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  Speaker 2: need to emphasize this does not mean that we are
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  Speaker 2: at the end of school challenges. No. Well, in recent
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  Speaker 2: weeks we've been dealing with some pretty significant challenges that
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  Speaker 2: are still happening in the classroom. So just because we've
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  Speaker 2: removed mobile phones does not mean that screens are not
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  Speaker 2: still having a humongous impact.
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  Speaker 1: Right, kids are still doing the wrong thing on screens,
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  Speaker 1: and they're also doing the wrong things on phones at home,
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  Speaker 1: school buses, and because the phones aren't banned except during school.
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  Speaker 1: So it's not a panacea. It doesn't fix everything. But
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  Speaker 1: no one ever promised that it would. This initial data, though,
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  Speaker 1: is really promising demonstrating that it was the right call.
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  Speaker 2: It was the right call. But for me, I feel
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  Speaker 2: like as a parent, what it should actually suggest and
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  Speaker 2: say is, and you've been saying this forever, but we
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  Speaker 2: need to delay, delay, delay in giving our children access
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  Speaker 2: to them.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I'm going to make an even more shocking and
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  Speaker 1: provocative point, and that's this. We faced all of this
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  Speaker 1: opposition in saying kids don't need mobile phones at schools.
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  Speaker 1: But what I'm consistently saying is kids don't need mobile
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  Speaker 1: phones if you get these kinds of reductions in the
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  Speaker 1: school context. Imagine the kinds of reductions you would get
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  Speaker 1: if you took phones out of kids' hands, or took
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  Speaker 1: them away from social media in the home context, in
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  Speaker 1: the school bus, school camp.
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  Speaker 2: In their friendships. It like just it's astounding.
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  Speaker 1: I don't think that there's any strong argument that you
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  Speaker 1: can mount that children need smartphones. And I've said this,
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  Speaker 1: I think I've been saying this since about twenty sixteen.
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  Speaker 1: Kids don't need smartphones. They need smart parents, and smart
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  Speaker 1: parents give their kids dumb phones. If you want to
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  Speaker 1: know where your child is, if you want to be
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  Speaker 1: able to text them, check in with them, make sure
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  Speaker 1: they're okay. There are so many devices that they can
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  Speaker 1: use that do not have the functionality of a full
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  Speaker 1: blown supercomputer in their pocket. And again, I know that
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  Speaker 1: I've just shared this, but these stats are stunning. An
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  Speaker 1: eighty seven percent drop in student distraction, eighty one percent
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  Speaker 1: of students have seen improved learning, a sixty three percent
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  Speaker 1: decline in critical incidents, and a fifty four percent drop
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  Speaker 1: in behavioral issues.
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  Speaker 2: When you think about the challenges that teachers, principles, and
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  Speaker 2: students are dealing with on a day to day basis
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  Speaker 2: in the classroom, to be able to tick all of
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  Speaker 2: those boxes massive that it literally changes the environment our
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  Speaker 2: children are in.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it does, I mean not enough. There's still more
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  Speaker 1: to do. The federal government's going to bring in this
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  Speaker 1: legislation we hope fingers crossed at the end of the
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  Speaker 1: year where social media is banned for all kids under sixteen. Again,
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  Speaker 1: that won't solve everything because they're still arguing over what
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  Speaker 1: they're going to define social media as. Which apps will
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  Speaker 1: be okay, which apps won't be okay? Is a messaging
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  Speaker 1: app the same as a social media app? And also
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  Speaker 1: kids will still be able to be on games and
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  Speaker 1: they will still be able to communicate with their friends digitally,
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  Speaker 1: and there still will be problems. So it doesn't solve everything,
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  Speaker 1: but these restrictions are important, they're working, they were necessary
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: after the break. Three quick take home messages around how
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  Speaker 1: we can keep our kids safe based on what we're
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  Speaker 1: learning here. Okay, Kylie, this is the podcast with real
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  Speaker 1: parenting solutions every day. Before we talk about the solutions,
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  Speaker 1: I guess the take home messages, the standout ideas that
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  Speaker 1: come from this data. I just want to highlight something else.
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  Speaker 1: The federal government brought in a new series of laws
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  Speaker 1: around vaping. It bans the sale of vapes in corner stores.
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  Speaker 1: Came in around about I don't know, six or eight
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  Speaker 1: months ago now, and data shows that the number of
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  Speaker 1: teenagers fourteen to seventeen using vapes nationwide has declined since
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  Speaker 1: those bands came in into force. Additionally, vaping rates have
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  Speaker 1: dropped by a third in fifteen to twenty nine year
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  Speaker 1: olds according to the South Australia Health, a medical research institute,
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  Speaker 1: compared to data from twenty twenty four to twenty twenty three.
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  Speaker 1: So what we're seeing, oh, in South Australian schools a
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  Speaker 1: reduction of fifty percent in suspensions related to vaping since
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  Speaker 1: the changes.
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  Speaker 2: So can I ask you a question, how reliable are
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  Speaker 2: the numbers.
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  Speaker 1: As anybody there as good as any data that you
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  Speaker 1: can get hold of for things like this. These are
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  Speaker 1: surveys of principles. Principles do keep well, most schools do
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  Speaker 1: keep reasonable statistics on what they're doing in terms of
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  Speaker 1: suspensions and expulsions. They absolutely have data on critical incidents,
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  Speaker 1: so researchers are collecting the data. The information is do
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  Speaker 1: you know what, This is a really hard thing for
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  Speaker 1: me to say as a social scientist, as someone with
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  Speaker 1: a doctorate in psychology, Psychological data and even a lot
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  Speaker 1: of health data is actually pretty rubbish. Like if you
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  Speaker 1: go and do a chemistry experiment, the data is pure.
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  Speaker 1: And that's why they talk about physics and chemistry and
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  Speaker 1: even biology pure sciences. Things like psychology and social sciences
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  Speaker 1: are consistently looked down on by the pure scientists because
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  Speaker 1: there's so much noise in the data. But nurance and
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  Speaker 1: that's right, and you can't measure everything. Yeah, but even
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  Speaker 1: if it's not completely accurate, it's directional. And when you
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  Speaker 1: get this level of number, Okay, so we've got eighty
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  Speaker 1: seven percent, or we've got a reduction of fifty percent,
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  Speaker 1: or we've got to drop in sixty seven percent, whatever
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  Speaker 1: the numbers are. Maybe it's not that good. Maybe it's
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  Speaker 1: forty three percent or twenty eight percent. But we're still
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  Speaker 1: heading in that direction. Like when you get the numbers
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  Speaker 1: this big, it's directional, and that tells us that we
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  Speaker 1: are on the right path. We are heading in the
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  Speaker 1: right direction. There is value in what we're doing. So
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  Speaker 1: we can get caught up on being exactly precise, exactly right,
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  Speaker 1: and I know that in our society we care a
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  Speaker 1: lot about that, But sometimes it's better to just know
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  Speaker 1: that what you're doing is useful even if you can't
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  Speaker 1: be precise with it. And that's the way that I
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  Speaker 1: tend to approach pretty much everything that I teach, all
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  Speaker 1: of the psychological science stuff. We know that this is
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  Speaker 1: usually useful most of the time for most people under
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  Speaker 1: most circumstances, when things are normal, right, And that's the
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  Speaker 1: best that we can do, and that is helpful. That
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  Speaker 1: is useful even if it's not going to be perfectly
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  Speaker 1: correct for everybody. You're unlikely to do harm when the
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  Speaker 1: majority of the data points in this direction. That was
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  Speaker 1: a long granser than you were looking for.
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  Speaker 2: No, not at all, Not at all. I guess the
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  Speaker 2: concern is, from time to time we have these numbers
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  Speaker 2: that feel great, but in reality are they and we're
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  Speaker 2: kind of giving ourselves a pattern on the back for
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  Speaker 2: achieving something that we may not have. But the understanding
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  Speaker 2: that where data is directional is definitely helpful.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. Ultimately, we know that since schools
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  Speaker 1: have banned phones, there's less bullying, there are fewer critical incidents,
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  Speaker 1: and children are learning more.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, because even if the numbers weren't eighty seven and they.
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  Speaker 1: Were fifty four, I'll take that.
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  Speaker 2: It would take it that way, Yeah, exactly.
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  Speaker 1: And similarly with vapes, there's an improvement here. It's not
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  Speaker 1: eradicating the problem. You're never going to eradicate the problem,
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  Speaker 1: not in a society this big, in this complex, but
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  Speaker 1: it's reducing it. It's directionally helpful, and we're seeing positive
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  Speaker 1: outcomes as a result.
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  Speaker 2: Well, prevention is always going to be better than repair
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  Speaker 2: in any society. So the fact that we have vapes
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  Speaker 2: in our community, we're never going to get rid of them, Okay.
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  Speaker 1: And you could pick any problematic or challenging or unhealthy behavior,
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  Speaker 1: and what we're trying to do is mitigate or minimize
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  Speaker 1: kids access to those challenges. So here are three things
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  Speaker 1: that I take from all of this data. Number one,
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  Speaker 1: I kind of want to you know, when you see
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: little kids they put their thumb on their nose and
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: then they extend their fingers and whiggle them around and
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: they go no, no, no in it. I kind of
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  Speaker 1: want to do a bit of an I told you so,
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  Speaker 1: because there have been a number of critics who really
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  Speaker 1: roused on me and said, you're being reactionary and banning
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  Speaker 1: phones in schools won't make one jot of difference, and
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  Speaker 1: kids have got to learn how to navigate a world
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  Speaker 1: where they're surrounded by this stuff.
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  Speaker 2: This breaks my heart when I hear this. I had
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  Speaker 2: a conversation with a friend the other day and it
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  Speaker 2: was she had a conversation with her child's teacher, and
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  Speaker 2: it was the same thing.
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  Speaker 1: I've been come following you.
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  Speaker 2: It's the same thing. Though. Our justification for allowing kids
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  Speaker 2: to be exposed to an adult world is that they're
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  Speaker 2: gonna have to learn. But my kid's six, or my
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  Speaker 2: kid's nine, my kid's fourteen, they're not an adult, right
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  Speaker 2: and they shouldn't have to be learning to navigate an
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  Speaker 2: adults world at any stage of that childhood process.
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  Speaker 1: So this brings me to my second point, and that
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  Speaker 1: is that I actually I still wish government would stay
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: out of our lives as much as possible. I really
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: don't want them intervening. But the reality is, and I
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  Speaker 1: hesitate to say it because I hate throwing shade at parents,
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  Speaker 1: but the reality is, too many parents are not up
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  Speaker 1: to the task. They're not doing the job when it
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  Speaker 1: comes to kids and screens, and therefore we need to
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  Speaker 1: have government intervention to protect vulnerable people. So the government's intervening,
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  Speaker 1: they're actually doing the right thing. We have government intervention
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: for things like gambling, for alcohol, for tobacco, for other drugs,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: for driving, for I mean, pick whatever it is you want,
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  Speaker 1: all of these things that we know can cause harm.
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  Speaker 1: The government says, you know what, if you're an adult,
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  Speaker 1: we're going to let you do this, because if you
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: choose that as an adult, that's on you. But we
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: need to protect vulnerable people, and children are among the
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: most vulnerable, especially when it comes to their interaction with screens.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: The government has gotten this right. They're doing the right
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: thing with the Social Media band. I can't wait till
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: the end of the year for that to come in,
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: although again it's not going to be enough, and there's
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: going to be all sorts of holes that we could
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: probably poke in. It I wish that they would do
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: it about pornography. This is the elephant in the room,
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  Speaker 1: and the government has been absolutely spineless in dealing with this,
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: and it is at the root of so many of
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: our challenges.
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  Speaker 2: It all comes down to money.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: I think that it does, and the loud voices that
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: are saying, you can't take away my civil liberties. Have
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: to identify myself so that I can click on that website.
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  Speaker 1: Now you know too much about me, which is ludicrous
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: because look at what the tech companies know. The tech
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  Speaker 1: companies know more than the governments will ever know giving
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: them all of our information. Last point, and we're out
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  Speaker 1: of time, so I'm going to make this thirty seconds
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: or less. The more we get screens out of classrooms,
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  Speaker 1: the better children's learning is.
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  Speaker 2: This is the better their relationships are, the better everything is.
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  Speaker 2: Like everything.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it flies in the face of Kevin Rudd's two
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: thousand and seven two thousand and eight education revolution, where
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: every kid needs an iPad or a tablet or a laptop.
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  Speaker 1: He got it completely wrong.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: He did get it completely wrong. But he's also dealing
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: with a brand new something that nobody understood. God, don't
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: stir in the room.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: I don't buy it. I think that it was a
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: terrible choice. I think that giving kids an iPad so
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: that they can learn more about technology and how to
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: navigate the digital world is like giving kids a Tonka
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: truck so that they can become a mechanic. It's just
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: I think he got it wrong. From the outset. Data
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: now is pointing to processing and learning being far better
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: with analog rather than digital learning tools, and the best
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: schools in Australia I'm talking about some of Australia's most
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: exclusive and elite schools are now starting to minimize and
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: even eliminate technology from classrooms and they're going analog. Our
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: kids live better with analog lives because they've got analog brains.
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: We're dealing with, as Scott Galloway says.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: Lazy learners.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: No, no, that's not what he says. We've got godlike technology,
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: but we're using paleolithic neural architecture to navigate it and
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: our brains just can't do it. It's not how we were designed.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: So that's the Doctor's Desk episode today. Great chat, good
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: to see the data coming through and nice to feel
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: a little bit vindicated. But more than that, nice to
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: see that children are able to do better because we're
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: making these decisions on their behalf that are in their
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: best interests. The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Rouland from Bridge Media. More information and more resources to
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: make your family happier are available at happy families dot com,
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: dot a u