Abingdon News No.51

www.abingdon.org.uk 21 Is there anything a phone can’t do? It can track your fitness, find your friends, enable you to shop with an app that links to a camera in your fridge; we bank from our phones, airdrop photos, and now phones even recognise our faces. Without doubt, modern phones are beyond smart. For all that, at Abingdon we believe phones cannot replace real, face to face relationships. Yes, you can facetime the other side of the world but it isn’t the same as sitting in a room with someone, reacting and responding to their emotions, feelings, likes and dislikes. That is why we have decided to try to help our students to reboot their relationships with their phones. We want them to embrace the myriad of opportunities that technology offers, and hopefully to spot the areas where technology could do more to improve lives. However, at the same time, we want our boys to remember that humans are social beings and that living in the moment, and sharing real experiences in real time, is at the core of living a fulfilled, happy life. For this reason, we have said to pupils in the Fifth Year and below - those crucial developmental teenage years where the frontal cortex is battling to overthrow the dominance of the amygdala – that phones should not be seen or heard during school. Bring them to school for practical reasons, but during the day put them away, out of sight and out of mind. Enjoy spending time with your mates; seize all the opportunities available - there is no other time of life which offers so much. Rather than always looking down at a screen, living life vicariously through Snapchat and Instagram, we want our pupils to look up, look out and do the things that a phone can’t do: make friends and make memories. On Saturday 18th May ASPA held a Mexican-themed event for third year parents in the dining hall, with a welcome margarita and a wide variety of Central American delights served by the Abingdon Catering Team. The evening was a great opportunity for parents to mix across the whole year group in a warm and friendly atmosphere – with plenty of ponchos and sombreros for good measure! Abingdon Parents’ Association Date for the diary Continuing the successful theme, there will be a Mexican-style event for this year’s third year parents too on Saturday 5th October in the Dining Hall at Abingdon School from 7.30pm. Tickets on sale from the start of September. [email protected] www.abingdon.org.uk/aspa Mexico comes to Abingdon What phones can’t yet do… Mark Hindley, Deputy Head (Pastoral)