Student_Voice : Do I need a smartphone?
Published: 23 Feb. 2026, 00:05
Updated: 24 Feb. 2026, 14:12
Daemyung Hwang
The author is a student at Seoul Beodle Elementary School.
As I waited for the bus, I was using my smartphone to watch YouTubers build Lego tanks.
“Oh, too bad I didn’t bring those bricks with me,” I thought. “I really want to build that!”
When the bus came, I heard the usual loud vrooming sound and a little squeak as it stopped. Without letting my eyes come unglued from the phone, I started to get on the bus. Before I reached the first step, I suddenly fell forward, my right leg flailing in empty space.
“Help!” I thought. As if someone had heard my thoughts, a hand grasped my arm and pulled me up. It was my dad, his eyes as wide and fierce as a hurricane.
After I found a seat on the bus, I started to think about my phone. It sucked up all my attention. While using it, I totally forgot about everything else.
If my father hadn’t been there, I would have fallen face-first onto the asphalt. It made me wonder: Should kids really own a smartphone?
![McLaren 720S Spider roared by Daereungwon, Gyeongju in North Gyeongsang on Feb. 15, 2026. Eating 10-won sibwonppang, the bone-rattling engine noise made me leap up, grab my phone, and snap it. Dad photographed me mid-shot. [HWANG DAE-MYUNG, HWANG JOO-WON]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2026/02/24/a94690f5-0fce-4d88-a528-a871a8560ae0.jpg)
About a year later, I was looking at my phone while waiting for my mom to pick me up after class. After calling her, I changed my phone’s wallpaper because I was bored. Still fumbling and pressing buttons, I heard a car approaching and noticed a bright yellowish light out of the corner of my eye. But I didn’t look up from my phone. I kept pressing buttons. Finally, I heard the unmistakable sound of my mom calling my name, and it hit me — I was keeping her waiting! Sorry, mom!
Here’s another incident: When I came home from school one day, I began to prepare an experiment for science class. First, I needed to fill a jar with water. After I turned on the faucet, my phone buzzed. I received the call and it lasted for one minute. As I ended the call, I noticed the familiar sound of rushing water, and then noticed it had spilled all over the bathroom floor. My phone had played its distraction trick once again.
Plenty of others have the same problem. While walking through the park, I notice people looking at their phones instead of the beautiful scenery. I see kids riding bikes, focused on their phones instead of the people around them. One time, I even saw a woman in our apartment complex trip over a rock as she stared at her phone.
While riding my football academy bus, I had a question for my friend and tapped him on the shoulder. He continued playing a game on his phone where he bashed trees with a chainsaw. I poked him again, but he didn’t respond. It seemed that he couldn’t even hear my voice. “Hello? Hello?” He was completely frozen and mindless, like a zombie in a horror movie, or a student under the paralysis curse from Harry Potter.
After noticing these things, I made a goal of using my phone only for necessary calls or for playing an educational game to learn new vocabulary. I now keep my phone inside my backpack and turn it off when not in use. Instead of more screen time, I play board games, read books or watch the world around me.
In particular, I like to look for sports cars. I once saw a Ferrari in the parking lot of a sushi restaurant, its blue body gleaming in the light. On another occasion, there was an evergreen Aston Martin outside my English academy, its chassis only a few centimeters from the ground. The rarest sports car I’ve seen in my life was a Lamborghini Revuelto. The aerodynamic orange body looked like a cheetah with wheels.
When I pay attention to the world and see cars like this, I feel alive and excited. I’m instantly in a better mood. On a phone screen, you don’t really see these cars. You don’t notice the texture or the bright energy, and you can’t appreciate the true size. The real world doesn’t fit inside our phones.
The author is a student at Seoul Beodle Elementary School.
As I waited for the bus, I was using my smartphone to watch YouTubers build Lego tanks.
“Oh, too bad I didn’t bring those bricks with me,” I thought. “I really want to build that!”
When the bus came, I heard the usual loud vrooming sound and a little squeak as it stopped. Without letting my eyes come unglued from the phone, I started to get on the bus. Before I reached the first step, I suddenly fell forward, my right leg flailing in empty space.
“Help!” I thought. As if someone had heard my thoughts, a hand grasped my arm and pulled me up. It was my dad, his eyes as wide and fierce as a hurricane.
After I found a seat on the bus, I started to think about my phone. It sucked up all my attention. While using it, I totally forgot about everything else.
If my father hadn’t been there, I would have fallen face-first onto the asphalt. It made me wonder: Should kids really own a smartphone?
McLaren 720S Spider roared by Daereungwon, Gyeongju in North Gyeongsang on Feb. 15, 2026. Eating 10-won sibwonppang, the bone-rattling engine noise made me leap up, grab my phone, and snap it. Dad photographed me mid-shot. [HWANG DAE-MYUNG, HWANG JOO-WON]
About a year later, I was looking at my phone while waiting for my mom to pick me up after class. After calling her, I changed my phone’s wallpaper because I was bored. Still fumbling and pressing buttons, I heard a car approaching and noticed a bright yellowish light out of the corner of my eye. But I didn’t look up from my phone. I kept pressing buttons. Finally, I heard the unmistakable sound of my mom calling my name, and it hit me — I was keeping her waiting! Sorry, mom!
Here’s another incident: When I came home from school one day, I began to prepare an experiment for science class. First, I needed to fill a jar with water. After I turned on the faucet, my phone buzzed. I received the call and it lasted for one minute. As I ended the call, I noticed the familiar sound of rushing water, and then noticed it had spilled all over the bathroom floor. My phone had played its distraction trick once again.
Plenty of others have the same problem. While walking through the park, I notice people looking at their phones instead of the beautiful scenery. I see kids riding bikes, focused on their phones instead of the people around them. One time, I even saw a woman in our apartment complex trip over a rock as she stared at her phone.
While riding my football academy bus, I had a question for my friend and tapped him on the shoulder. He continued playing a game on his phone where he bashed trees with a chainsaw. I poked him again, but he didn’t respond. It seemed that he couldn’t even hear my voice. “Hello? Hello?” He was completely frozen and mindless, like a zombie in a horror movie, or a student under the paralysis curse from Harry Potter.
After noticing these things, I made a goal of using my phone only for necessary calls or for playing an educational game to learn new vocabulary. I now keep my phone inside my backpack and turn it off when not in use. Instead of more screen time, I play board games, read books or watch the world around me.
In particular, I like to look for sports cars. I once saw a Ferrari in the parking lot of a sushi restaurant, its blue body gleaming in the light. On another occasion, there was an evergreen Aston Martin outside my English academy, its chassis only a few centimeters from the ground. The rarest sports car I’ve seen in my life was a Lamborghini Revuelto. The aerodynamic orange body looked like a cheetah with wheels.
When I pay attention to the world and see cars like this, I feel alive and excited. I’m instantly in a better mood. On a phone screen, you don’t really see these cars. You don’t notice the texture or the bright energy, and you can’t appreciate the true size. The real world doesn’t fit inside our phones.
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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