I don't police cell phones as strictly as most teachers because I really think the benefits of cell phones outweigh the harms. I know this is an unpopular opinion, and while I don't think students should have total freedom with their phones (everything in moderation, yes) I do think there is a place for smart phones in the classroom, especially a science class. The amazing thing is....when students are actually engaged, most of them can police their own use of cell phones without my help. If I can train students to self regulate with technology, that not only takes the stress off of me, but it makes the students feel less irritated from having an adult constantly berate them for being on their phones. Figuring out how to design a lesson that engages students productively with their smartphones is the hardest and most rewarding challenge of teaching for me this year. 

Here are six ways to use smartphones in the classroom

1. Gimkit and Kahoot

• A lot of us are familiar with Kahoot which serves as a good review game. Gimkit is similar to Kahoot, but adds another twist of extra competition, power ups, and money. Both Kahoot and Gimkit engage students by gamifying the classroom. Even the kids who can't get off their video games love playing Gimkit. 

2. Quizlet Live

• Quizlet Live is great for getting students to actually communicate productively with each other. The downside is....a lot of students struggle to communicate, so this game can be stressful for a lot of students. With practice though, students do get used to communicating, and Quizlet live is a good way to practice that skill. 

3. Pear deck

• Pear deck teaches vocabulary and involves drawing (which is easier to do on a touchscreen smartphone than on a computer). It's like Pictionary and students like sketching things out on their smartphone for their classmates to see.  

4. Smartphone Camera 

• If students don't finish a lab/activity, they can take a picture of their work to remember where they left off for next time. Cameras are good for activities that involve stations (students can submit pictures of their work at the station for grading). I require students to use smartphone cameras in the lab to document stages of an experiment for their lab reports. Cameras are also useful for students who have trouble seeing the board (a lot of students will take pictures of the board and zoom in on their phone to see better). 

5. Air drop 

• I've air dropped pictures and screenshots to students before. Students also air drop each other notes and photos (sometimes they're cheating I'll admit, but other times they're genuinely collaborating)

6. Suite.smarttech.org 

• If you have a Smartboard, this one is a necessity. Students can log into www.hellosmart.com and they'll be able to see and interact with the Smartboard on their smartphone. Since the Smartboard is a touch screen, it makes sense to let students use their phone (which is also a touchscreen) so they can interact with the Smartboard without having to leave their seat. 

While training students to be responsible with technology takes a lot of effort, I do think it's worth the effort to get students to self-regulate rather than banning phones all together. As a fellow Gen Zer/Millennial I actually agree with the students on a lot of their smartphone habits. I too take pictures instead of notes. I have my notes organized into photo albums on my phone. I look the periodic table up on the internet rather than carry a paper copy around with me all the time. Trusting the students to use their phones productively is a big leap of faith, but worth the effort in the long run. 

Active listening - aka listening in a way that actually engages with the person you're talking to. One reason why I used to hate doing "class discussions" is because the students never actually listened to each other. What was supposed to be a conversation always ended up feeling like a back and forward between individual students and the teacher, rather than a dialogue between everybody in the room. I wanted to explore complicated and important issues with the students, but we couldn't do that if the students weren't benefiting from each other's ideas. 

So what would happen if I could somehow break down the elements of a rich conversation into a set of concrete skills that I could teach the students? Turns out, such a structure already exists. It's called active listening and we can learn to be active listeners by practicing these four steps. 

4 steps of Active Listening

Step #1: Repeat back what you heard

• This gives the listener a chance to prove that he/she understands what is being said. 
• This gives the speaker a chance to clarify any misunderstandings

Step #2: Ask questions to clarify

• This gives the listener a chance to understand the speaker before the listener makes a counterargument

Step #3: Validate feelings, not necessarily logic

• Somebody's feelings are always valid, even if their logic is questionable
• Validation of feelings keeps the speaker engaged, even when there is disagreement 
• Failure to validate feelings dismisses the speaker and creates disengagement

Step #4: Build and complicate the idea

• This last step relates the speaker's ideas with the listener's ideas and creates a path for a more complicated conversation 

I used the following sentence starters to help students understand and practice each step of active listening. 

​First, I modeled for students how the sentence starters can be used in a conversation.

Here's the first conversation we had as a class. 

• Ms. Tsai - "I think mint chocolate chip is the best flavor of ice cream" 
• Student 1- (Repeat) "So you're saying that you think mint chip is the best?" 
• Ms. Tsai - "Yes, mint chip has the perfect balance of chocolate and non-chocolate flavors; therefore, it's the best" 
• Student 2- (Ask) - "Can you say more about how you define 'best' flavor?" 
• Ms. Tsai - "The best flavor is the one that gives me the most enjoyment. All the fruit flavors are boring and the chocolate flavors are too sweet" 
• Student 3( Validate) - "I can see why you would feel mint chip is the best, but have you tried all the flavors of ice cream to know for sure?" 
• Ms. Tsai - "I don't think I need to try every single flavor in order to know which one is the best" 
• Student 4 (Build) - "While it may be true that you think mint chip is the best, I think we should also consider what everybody else thinks. Maybe we should do a poll and find out" 

​Next, we had individual students take turns to be in the "hot seat" and propose a controversial opinion. Students came up with all sorts of interesting topics......from school lunches, to music, to whether porn was a good thing or not. After the "hot seat" student shared his/her controversial opinion, the audience used their active listening skills to probe the person in the "hot seat" and create a richer conversation. Students had fun with debating about things they care about. They were also excited to actually have an engaging conversation with each other for once! 

Finally, we steered our conversations towards topics more relevant to the content we were studying in class. Students worked in small groups to practice the four steps of active listening using scenarios related to gene therapy and bioethics **disclosure these scenarios were not written entirely by me. 

This week is the last week of the second quarter, and I'm still trying to figure out how to best use class time during this awkward transition week. It's the end of the quarter and everybody's tired. I don't want to assign any more work this week since I want to devote my time to grading final projects. I want to make class time meaningful while giving everybody a chance to breathe and reflect.

So I thought....why not let the students choose what they want to do? And what did they choose? They chose to play Just Dance, and I was all for it. 

For those of you that questioned the yelling and singing from my classroom today (sorry about that!) here are four reasons why we devoted 15 minutes of class time today to the Just Dance Michael Jackson Experience (which by the way....is super good). 

So.......why should I let my students dance in class? 

1.  Playing games in class builds classroom culture 

• Dancing is a fun experience that's also a collaborative activity  
• Students that feel safe enough to dance together in class will also feel safe enough to take risks in their classwork together 

2. The students feel heard

• At the beginning of class, we took a poll on the smart board, and the students voted for Just Dance over two other activities. Students that feel like they're being listened to and taken seriously are more likely to cooperate later on when it comes to classwork.  

3. Exercising in the beginning of class helps students focus afterwards 

• You would think that dancing for 15 minutes at the beginning of class would throw off the class' focus but....actually no! The transition to classwork afterwards was quick and we were able to finish our benchmark presentations in a timely manner. 

4. It gives students a reason to want to come to class 

• It also gives me a reason to want to go to work! 

Maybe I'm just jealous that I never got to play Just Dance in class when I was in school, or maybe this is just my Zumba background infiltrating my teaching. The way I see it, in the real world, workplaces encourage team building, group exercise, and activities that build a positive culture. A classroom is no different. There's no reason to feel like we have to work all the time, especially at the end of the quarter. I want to hear your thoughts too! How do you spend the end of the quarter with your classes? ​