For the Luddites who have somehow avoided the gaming universe: Call of Duty is a computer/video game that first came out in 2003, published by Activision. The game simulates infantry and arms warfare. As of this date, many versions of the game exist, available for different gaming platforms. Recently, I know Call of Duty Black Ops was hot. My students played this game all night. I think some new version with ghosts and/or zombies is out now. Billions of dollars of Call of Duty have been sold with no end to the franchise in sight.

Eduhonesty: Call of Duty is not my friend. “Barry” recently complained that he was having trouble concentrating because he had been up playing Call of Duty all night for three days in a row. That schedule would whack anybody’s concentration. It might even put a few people in the hospital. I doubt Barry ate much while playing. He’s stick-thin. Gamers don’t stop to eat in the midst of a fierce battle and I suspect Barry’s life is almost nothing but a series of fierce battles except when he is forced to go school. He gives me regular reports on his clan’s progress.

The minimal silver lining to this storm cloud is that Call of Duty can be great leverage. “David” came in for help this week in part because, he told me, if he fails any classes both parents say they will take away his Call of Duty. That incentive, combined with a strict dad and mom, has David passing all his classes.

This post is for parents: If you are raising gamers, I sympathize. I sympathize with my students, for that matter. If I were an adolescent now, I just might be fighting all those battles to get my adrenalin rush. I might be a version of Barry. I don’t want to target Call of Duty specifically, either. I might as easily have written about Grand Theft Auto or a number of other titles.

But I’d like to ask parents to do a study. Keep track of the minutes your children spend on gaming in one week. You might also sit down and watch the games for awhile. There’s a reason why all my students can spell “strip club” and it has nothing to do with the school’s curriculum. Parents used to limit TV to make certain that books were read and homework got done. TV is much less addictive than gaming in my view. We need to put more brakes on the evening gaming, using technology to find out where homework and classwork is not getting done. These kids have 13 years of free education that are intended to lead to college when possible. As it stands, I’m afraid some of my students will be unready to function in college because they were too busy firing assault weapons and stealing cars in a virtual universe when they should have been eating, sleeping or even actually reading their textbooks.

I have many delightful students. They are good-natured, funny, creative and helpful. They pick up after themselves. They say thank-you when they receive candy. While in class, they work.

But they hardly ever do the homework. I think the call of Call of Duty is too much for some. Others find friends, favorite shows or Facebook to occupy their time.

Eduhonesty: I need parental help desperately here. Many districts now allow parents to look up school assignments online. Parents, please track homework completion if you are able. Otherwise, if your child is a middle-school or high-school students, check in with teachers if there never seems to be homework. Asking a kid, “Do you have any homework?” may not work. Sometimes the kid isn’t even lying when he or she denies the existence of assignments. I think some kids have a magic spell put on them that makes them forget homework as soon as they place the offending papers inside their lockers.

It may seem a bit elementary school, but a homework log meant to be signed by parent and teacher daily can help solve this problem.

She’s a single mom raising teen-age boys on her own. She’s got a fierce work ethic but she’s struggling to find employment. I’m pretty sure her world just tilted on its axis at some time in the past. Maybe the company folded or was sold to another company that shut down her division. Maybe dad left with a younger woman. Maybe he died. I never felt comfortable asking personal questions about the past.

Her son drove me nuts. He messed with me just to mess with me. He talked when I asked for quiet just to push my buttons. I’d say by the end he might even have been bullying me. Stepping outside the picture, I can understand some of what was happening. Mom had no job. Mom was scared. In a middle-class neighborhood, that kid had to be feeling poor. Passive-aggression was a completely understandable response to the pressures in his life.

That said, I called home a couple of times to flag mom to problems. The last time I encountered the following scenario:

Me: He … (story deleted to protect the guilty.)
Mom: Well that’s not what he says. He says you … He says…

It was my word versus her kid’s word. Suddenly I was on “Law and Order” and I was supposed to present my case.

I gave her the facts. Then I stopped calling.

Her son has chosen the wrong friends. I believe mom will be lucky not to have to bail him out of jail eventually. Those friends were busted during the school year for a pretty brazen theft.

But the whole thing ceased to be my problem with that last phone call.

Eduhonesty: I like to come home from school, plan tomorrow’s lesson, and then watch Sleepy Hollow or Dr. Who. I often need to grade some papers. I also have books to read. I have blogging to do. I have a life. If I take time out of my evening to call a parent, it’s because I think there’s an issue that matters enough for me to sacrifice my time.

I don’t just make up stories to oppress innocent little 16-year old boys.

For parents: If the teacher calls, the teacher has a pretty good reason. He or she is using valuable minutes — I don’t have nearly enough of those minutes — to try to alert you to trouble, in hopes that a bad habit or social situation can be managed before it gets out of hand. When a parent then leaps in to defend the kid, the teacher will likely make a mental note not to mess (or help) with the situation. I may make a few more calls to document that I did not let “Johnnie” fail or get arrested without trying to intervene. But there’s the two minute call that says “he needs to turn in his homework” and there’s the 10 minute call where we actually make a plan to get that homework turned in. If I am going to be cross-examined, you’ll get the two-minute call — if you get any call at all.

We talk to our phones. Our phones talk back. My phone will happily provide me with all kinds of advice and information.

My phone will also allow me to play endless games, timed and untimed, alone and in groups. I gave my advisory a free day and watched as five of them played a game together, each on their own phone, in a mysterious competition with crashing cars. The phones find each other, linking the players together.

Many readers understand this perfectly, of course.

I’m not sure how many readers understand the temptation these games pose, though. I watched as my Jehovah’s Witness, a serious boy who would not accept pagan Halloween candy because of its tainted associations, joined in the game. This boy did homework almost daily. He had been known to read the Bible when he had no work. I watched him smile and laugh as he crashed cars.

I’m pretty sure Jehovah Witness’s mom would not have approved of that day’s activity. I am also sure that this boy has played a lot of group games under the radar. He didn’t ask for any help getting set up.

Gaming does not steal nearly as many minutes from learning as texting does — it’s too obvious — but it’s still a problem. Plenty of one-player game options exist. Students have said to me, “Please, just let me finish the game. I’m almost done,” as if this is a reasonable request. Or, “C’mon, I’m close to my highest score ever!”

Eduhonesty: If we want to improve America’s test scores, we had better begin to ban or block phones. They are too tempting.

Sorry about the lack of posts. I have been visiting elderly parents in a techno-free zone.

As I sat in the early 20th century house with its tub, but no shower, I reflected on how little we talk about the maelstrom of technology that is sweeping learning down the technological drain.

Smartboards are nifty. Interactive technology is frequently an educational win. I’m not technophobic in the least.

But those phones are doing damage, especially at the high school level. It used to be that you needed to be sitting near your friend or girlfriend to pass notes. Now you don’t even have to be in the same city. In a large classroom, students can stash phones in laps and behind books or bags as they tune out the outside world while tap tap tapping class minutes away. They are usually easy to spot. A student can only stare fixedly at his or her lap for so long before the teacher should start walking toward that phone.

Eduhonesty: Unless you are in the classroom, I believe it’s probably hard to visualize how much trouble these phones represent in the aggregate. Readers probably think, “Well, seize the phones!” We do sometimes. It’s a lot of work and trouble to be grabbing up phones, though. I’ve known captured phones to disappear from the Dean’s Office. I’ve known students to claim their phones were damaged while in school custody. While some parents may be supportive of the school’s disciplinary actions, others will storm into school, loudly demanding that the school return their property. Personal privacy issues quickly come into play too.

Many schools have somewhat of a handle on the phone challenge, but no school I know of has managed to gain total control of phones. These small rectangular solids suck up educational minutes, turning them into opportunities to misspell and butcher the English language while making dates to meet in some adult-free house after school. I have scanned message threads when picking up phones.

This is for the parents: You want your kids to be safe. That’s why you bought the phone probably, along with a need to quiet the chorus of “But everybody has one!” Just about everybody does have one by high school, no matter how poor the district. Middle schools don’t lack for phones either. I feel compelled to give some advice, though: Check those phones when you can. You need to know that Tom’s aunt works and the house is always empty in the afternoon. You need to know that Penelope is meeting Tom at that house every afternoon. Even if the messages are more innocuous, you need to know that your son or daughter somehow managed to spend hours on the phone when they were supposed to be learning math and English.