This year at Benilde-St. Margaret’s both teachers and students are seeing a rise of online games being played on laptops. While the games are usually played during downtime in class, they are also being played while students are supposed to be doing class work. This can lead to others being distracted as well.

Students find that you can still succeed in a class even if you aren’t always paying attention. “I play a lot of Tetris, and I started playing because I realized that there was a lot of downtime in class where we just weren’t doing anything. So I thought oh, I can just play Tetris and still do good in the class,” junior Siena Carver said.

In some cases students remember playing games when they were younger. It reminds them how fun the game is and so they redownload it. “I used to play some games on my phone and I deleted it. Then I saw someone playing it on their computer and I was like, Oh my gosh, I remember that game I’m going to download it. Now I play all the time in my classes,” junior Mandy Cronin said.

When students are playing games on their laptops around other students it is easy to get distracted. The distraction can also cause that student to do bad in a class because they weren’t listening. “I often feel distracted because I like to watch what they’re doing and judge how good they’re doing, and I find it very entertaining,” Carver said.

Teachers have seen an increase in students playing games on their laptops or getting off track easily. They have different approaches to keeping students on track, but most tend to just cut back on using laptops. “I have tried to limit screen time most of the time so that [the laptops] don’t become problems. But yes, I have seen [an increase in distraction],” English Teacher Paul Canavati said.

Being in the 21st century there are a lot of opportunities for computers to be helpful for research or writing a paper. Laptop usage also comes with a responsibility that you have to use your time wisely. “We’re in 2023 and so much of our curriculum requires the use of computers. But there’s certainly a level of responsibility that needs to happen with having a computer, like if you’re going to use it incorrectly, maybe you shouldn’t have one,” Canavati said