DO STUDENTS NEED MOBILE PHONES?

Nowadays, the mobile phone is very important to all people in the world. And it is not impossible that children as young as seven years old use a handset. The old mobile phone is big and only used to connect with other people but now the latest mobile phone is very small and has new functions such as multimedia messaging service (MMS), MP3, mobile Internet, digital camera and short messaging service (SMS).

We always wonder why some students use handsets and bring them to school? The view from Mohd Hanafie bin Mat Hussin is, “Some students use the handsets and bring them to school because it is easy for them to call their parents and family in time of emergency. They also want to look cool and dressy to their friends”. Other reasons are to call and send short message service (SMS) to their friends about swapping gossips and passing e-notes in class. When all their friends have handsets, they also want to have their own handsets.

Some students save their own pocket money to buy handset while the other students earn money without telling their parents first. They just want to fulfill their dreams although their parents may forbid them to have one. If their parents know, the latter will scold them for buying a handset without telling them first. In their parents’ eyes, a handset is the most useless thing.

The complication of having a handset is that when other friends are jealous of those who have a handset, they might steal one. Some students spend more time on using handsets than on studying. This will make them neglect their lesson, not do their homework and not read their books. Thus, they will not achieve a good result on examinations because they neglected their studies and they always prepared at the eleventh hour as they would rather play with their handsets than study. When they know about their result, they feel so much regret because when the other students were burning midnight oil, they were messaging, playing games and doing nonsensical things. They never realise the importance of education. This means they have to turn into a new leaf if they want to be successful in life.

So, our school has to forbid students to bring mobile phone to school because it can interrupt the process of learning and teaching in our school.