The Times They Are a Changin’…

humor, lessons learned, Teaching and Education, technology 1 Minute

Prior to the start of one of my classes this morning, I looked around the room at the students who had arrived early.

At this point there were about 10-15 students, about half the class.

I then noticed every one of them had something in common.

No, they weren’t all wearing Villanova Basketball t-shirts.

No, they weren’t getting ready to settle in for a nice nap once class got started. Well, at least not all of them.

And no, they’re weren’t actively discussing what we had covered the previous class.

I can tell you they were all doing something I would have never dreamed of doing when I was in college 45 years ago.

So what was it they were doing?

Every one of them was using their smartphone. (And as a I vaguely recall every single one of those smartphones was an iPhone).

Now I am not making any judgment here. I certainly use my phone quite often, and in the same exact way that these students did. When I’ve got a few spare moments, odds are quite high I’ll check my phone.

It just got me thinking about what I was doing when I was sitting in a classroom, ready for the class to begin.

I’m not positive, but my guess I was drawing stars all over my notebook.

If given the choice, I would have gone with the smartphone as well…

Published by Jim Borden

A 60-something guy trying to figure out the world, and his place in it. Happily married for 40-plus years, three wonderful sons. Accounting teacher, fitness enthusiast, blogger, reader.

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75 thoughts on “The Times They Are a Changin’…”

  10. They were all looking at the WSJ website, to see who’d win this week’s bet on which of its articles you’d take as a prompt for a blog post. Just as long as they weren’t all hacking in and checking YOUR blog stats…

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  14. but not interacting with each other which makes me sad. We’ve seen a huge shift in how we interact with one another. It will take decades to fully understand how this will affect society, but the change has already happened. It’s a giant sociological experiment. I’m not judging either. I’d much rather check my blog stats than talk with someone.

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    1. For some of my classes I have trouble getting class started because they are so busy chatting with each other. A couple of hours later, another class might be dead quiet, looking at their phones..

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  15. I would have been holding forth, Jim, or, as its commonly know, talking my head off. One of my school teachers wrote on my report that “generally speaking, Robbie is generally speaking.” I can remember this teacher and his comment very well.

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