Ms Pam Chuang, 47, who works in business development, is glad for stringent phone policies in schools.
“As adults, we can be tempted to check our phones often when we receive e-mail or social media notifications, so what more for our children,” said the mother of a Secondary 1 boy and Secondary 3 girl.
She does not mind that she cannot reach her children on their mobile devices during school hours when they have to switch them off or keep them in lockers.
“During emergency situations, when I need to pick them up early from school, I will call the general office, and the school staff will relay my messages to my children,” she said.
Mother-of-two Shoba Agnetha Seetaram, 44, said that while she supports school rules that prohibit the use of smart devices during lesson time, they do not necessarily reduce exposure to screen time in school.
“In secondary school, most of the work is online or on the tablet. And in primary school it’s definitely more exciting to do work online, like on KooBits rather than on paper,” said Ms Shoba, whose daughter is in Secondary 3 and son is in Primary 4. KooBits is an online learning platform for mathematics, English and science at the primary school level.
That being said, Ms Shoba, who is an early childhood educator, will not be giving her son a phone until he is in secondary school.
She also expects her daughter to give her full access to her mobile phone when Ms Shoba asks for it.
“We definitely cannot completely ban phone usage. That will set our children back in today’s fast-paced and high-tech world. But we can definitely control it, check on it and highly supervise it,” she said.