Kindergarteners Spill the Tea on Teacher's Classroom 'Tattlephone'

""Beckham was being bossy and said that he's the leader of everyone even though he's not." "Samantha said, 'Scram!' to Maverick." "Evan has two erasers in his pencil pouch." Teacher Laurel Bates loves to hear every word her kids tell her ... as long as they do it via her tattlephone, of course. "They feel seen and I stay sane," Bates tells TODAY.com."

""I just had so many students coming up to my desk, just constantly wanting to tell me things while I was trying to work one-on-one with students," Bates tells TODAY.com. She wanted a way to acknowledge their feelings without interruption. Her husband suggested a tattlephone. The idea of a tattlephone isn't a brand-new concept. After all, Bates had tried one in her classroom previously and it didn't gain much traction. But the previous phone was more like a toy. It didn't actually record messages."

""Most of them had never seen a phone before," Bates jokes. "They were like, 'What is this? An ancient artifact?'" Bates taught the kids to put one end of the receiver to their ear and the other to their mouth, how to speak clearly and the difference between a phone's "pound" button and a social media hashtag. When students pick up the phone they hear their teacher's voice saying, "Mrs. Bates can't come to the phone right now. Please leave your tattle, and I'll check it as soon as possible.""

Teacher Laurel Bates installed a recording tattlephone in her kindergarten classroom to collect students' brief voice messages and reduce interruptions during one-on-one instruction. The recording phone replaced a nonrecording toy version that failed to engage students. Bates taught children how to handle a handset, speak clearly, and use the phone's buttons, including the "pound" key. Students hear a prompt asking them to leave a tattle and may record messages during independent work or center time. The system lets children express concerns, helps them feel seen, and gives the teacher a manageable way to address social issues without constant interruption.

Read at TODAY.com