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by digitallyfree 1143 days ago
> “One kid kept opening up game sites” said one high school teacher who asked to stay anonymous, to protect the identities of their students. “I would wait for them to open one, add it to my list of blocked websites, refresh my settings, and then they would get locked out of it. Then they would open a new tab, find a new game site, and the cycle would repeat. This happened over and over over the course of about half an hour."

It strikes me as strange that the schools are playing a cat-and-mouse game rather than simply disciplining the students caught playing games or accessing these sites. Loss of privileges or so forth for violators would serve as an actual deterrent rather than encouraging students to simply find new ways to get around the block.
3 comments
aidenn0 1143 days ago
At least at the school my kids go to, the staff is basically not allowed to discipline students for minor infractions.

There were kids leaving trash out after lunch, and one of the staff had the worst offenders pick up trash before leaving the lunch room. This practice was banned because it was "degrading."

That's just the most recent story, there are dozens others like it.

More on topic, we got a letter from the teacher that my son was playing games. I said "why not just take the Chromebook away when that happens?"

The response: oh we can't do that.

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gs17 1143 days ago
Taking computers away means they can't use them for their intended purpose either. It's just going to be a bigger mess (if the alternative is less work, every kid will try to get banned) and end up with the headache of parents getting involved. My high school didn't punish students unless they did something really bad (someone I knew got in trouble for printing off porn).
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throwawayfaang9 1143 days ago
Or perhaps the lesson is that technology in the classroom is distracting more than it is teaching and we should use, say, paper?
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prmoustache 1143 days ago
what I don't understand is why they are working with a blacklist and not whitelist?

Sure kids would find ways to do something else or play the same way they use collaborative editing to chat but I don't even understand the purpose of letting them browse the whole internet during a class.

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