There is no question that the COVID-19 pandemic had a profound impact on student learning across the nation. As school districts grappled with remote learning during the lockdowns, the use of digital devices in teaching became the norm. Even after children returned to school, individually assigned computers such as Chromebooks remained a fixture in many classrooms.

While these devices can enhance instruction and offer educational opportunities, there are growing concerns about youth screen time and mental health.

In response, Bentonville School District has been rethinking computer usage in its classrooms. Administrators are digging into how much time students are spending in front of a screen with weekly reports, and teachers have been issued new guidelines for screen time in the classroom.

In its effort to educate parents and guardians on mental health and screens, the school district is hosting an event called Teens & Screens on Monday, Sept. 23, at 6 p.m. at the Arend Arts Center. Joe Thompson, president and CEO of the Arkansas Center for Health Improvement, will share research and recommendations for students surrounding technology use.

Technology In The Classroom

The Bentonville School District transitioned to one-to-one distribution of Chromebooks in 2020. How they are used and how often vary depending on grade level and subject.

Bentonville High School teacher Lora Pate said her AP students use Chromebooks to access library databases — which have all gone online — to do quality research.

“During the pandemic, I think most teachers drank from the fire hose in a sense,” she said. “What can I use? And we all played with a lot of different platforms to figure out how to communicate with our students virtually, and we honed our skills in those technological endeavors and I think a majority of us got wiser and better.”

She also noted that online platforms such as Google Classroom allow parents to easily follow their child’s progress and have instant access to grades. “To me, that’s an asset,” Pate said.

Katherine Collier, an English teacher at Grimsley Junior High School, said she’s seeing the pendulum “swinging the other way” from excessive screen time use during the pandemic.

“Now that we’re moving away from it, it’s kind of nice to bring back some of … the techniques that I would use before, some of the interactive things that I would be able to do in class that you just couldn’t do effectively online,” she said. “I definitely see more of the student interaction and the way that they communicate with each other is better with less technology.”

While Collier does use online programs that give students opportunities to practice their reading, writing and grammar skills, sometimes using the technology can slow their work down, she said, as students need to be taught how to properly use it to get the results they need.

“There’s just as much teaching the technology as there is using the technology,” she said.

She also requires her students to do pre-writing on paper as it gives her the ability to more easily identify the use of AI in final papers.

Both teachers cited a responsibility to find a balance.

“I do believe that they need to learn to disagree agreeably, and it’s hard to do that online,” Pate said. “Having those conversations face-to-face, and the body language and the facial expressions of others is a skill that we have to model, allow in the teaching process, and I believe that teachers here in Bentonville also value that.”

Technology At Home

Molly Fields, the parent of a high schooler, said over the summer that she was upset when her child came home with a Chromebook.

“I had to hide the Chromebook every night and on the weekends,” she wrote to The Bentonville Bulletin in August. “This made me, the parent, the bad guy. I did not like being put in this position.”

This fall, however, the school district incorporated an application that now allows parents to determine usage outside of school hours and manage specific settings.

In 2022, Bentonville School District officials decided to discontinue allowing kindergarteners and first-graders to take devices home. Last school year, the policy was adopted for all K-4 students, and it was extended to fifth- and sixth-graders this school year.

“We could use them at school on a limited basis, and let parents choose what they wanted to do with their students at home,” said Lisa St. John, executive director of elementary education, during a presentation on the screen time recommendations at a June Board of Education meeting.

Using The Data

Each week, principals and administrators are emailed a report on screen time usage. The report calculates averages for students, broken down by grade levels, for the past week.

“It really puts all of that valuable information into their hands and they can relay that plan to their campus,” said Aaron Nickles, executive director of technology, during the June meeting.

The data helps educators see if Chromebooks are being overused, Superintendent Debbie Jones added.

“And this is one piece of that puzzle,” she said. “When principals get this report, they can see if they’re an outlier,” She also noted this is combined with principal walk-throughs to check what students are working on when their devices are open.

New Guidelines

Last spring, school officials created classroom guidelines on screen time usage to be implemented this school year, individualized to K-4, middle and junior high, and high school levels. These recommendations include avoiding non-educational screen time, such as usage for indoor recess or tech rewards.

Bentonville School District’s suggested maximum recommended minutes of screen time per day are as follows:

• Kindergarten and first grade: 30 minutes

• Second and third grade: 45 minutes

• Fourth grade: 60 minutes

• Fifth through eighth grades: Less than 2 hours per day

High school guidelines are not defined in the same way because students use Google Classrooms, electronic work submission, word processing documents, spreadsheets and other interactive tools.

“Historically, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended up to two hours per day for teens, but the AAP has moved away from specific recommendations and now advises that this depends on particular situations,” said Dr. Jennifer Morrow, executive director of secondary education. “Realizing it is all situational is where we also are as a district.”

In the 2023-24 school year, high school students averaged two hours of screen time usage. Middle and junior high students averaged two hours and nine minutes, while elementary students averaged an hour. The jump in usage from elementary to middle school is due to technology classes students start taking that involve computers, such as computer science.

Teachers were presented with the guidelines at the beginning of this school year, but are not required to track the amount of time they use Chromebooks. Collier said she doesn’t feel like the recommendations have inhibited her teaching in any way, and that they have been a healthy reminder that balance is necessary.