Screen time limits for teenagers: a discussion lesson that Korean high schoolers will actually argue about
A 45-minute debate lesson on government-enforced phone curfews for under-16s, built on South Korea's real Shutdown Law history and current European proposals. Includes warm-up, balanced argument cards, and a vote students care about.
Park English · 2026-08-29 · 3 min read
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This lesson works because Korean teenagers have lived both sides. They grew up after the Shutdown Law banned under-16s from online games between midnight and 6am, then watched it get scrapped in 2021. Now Europe is considering similar rules. Your students have opinions before you hand out the cards.
It runs in one 45-minute block. You need nothing except the handout and a way to tally votes.
The structure
Warm-up (5 minutes) Ask: "How many hours of screen time did your phone say you had yesterday?" Let three or four students answer. Then: "Should the government be allowed to see that number and shut your phone off if it's too high?"
Do not discuss yet. Just let the question sit.
Argument prep (12 minutes) Split the room in half. One side gets the PRO cards, one gets CON. They do not have to agree with the side they are given — that is the point of debate prep.
Give them ten minutes in pairs to read the cards and pick their three strongest points. Tell them they can add one argument of their own if they think of something the sheet missed.
Debate (20 minutes) Run it as open discussion, not formal turns. Put the motion on the board: "The government should limit daily screen time for teenagers under 16."
Let a PRO student open. Then CON responds. After that, hands up. Your job is only to make sure both sides get equal time and that students speak to each other, not to you.
When it stalls, push it somewhere specific: "What about YouTube for homework research — does that count toward the limit?" or "Who decides what an emergency is?"
Vote and close (8 minutes) Tally three votes:
- Who agrees with the motion now?
- Who disagreed with the side they were assigned?
- Who changed their mind during the debate?
Ask one student from each camp why they voted the way they did. Then stop.
Why this works in a Korean hagwon
Korean students already know that policy like this is not hypothetical. The Shutdown Law was real, it affected online games most of them played, and their parents argued about it. When you say "Europe is considering this now," they know it is not a textbook scenario.
The debate also splits them in a way that "school uniforms" or "homework" does not. Some of your students are on their phones five hours a day and resent any limit. Others watched a friend's grades collapse because of phone addiction and think a cutoff is reasonable. You will see actual disagreement.
What to do if it dies
If the room goes quiet after two exchanges, break them into smaller groups of four and have each group prep one more argument for their side. Give them three minutes. Then reopen and ask each group to contribute their new point. That usually restarts it.
If one side is obviously winning, swap the question: "Okay, PRO is ahead. New vote: what if the limit was 3 hours instead of 2? Does that change anything?" Adjusting the number forces them to reconsider the principle.
What not to do
Do not lecture about screen addiction or phone overuse before the debate. The moment you frame it as a health lesson, half the room stops listening. Let them argue it out and discover those points themselves.
Do not let it become a complaint session about parents. When a student says, "My mom already checks my phone," acknowledge it and redirect: "Right — so is government enforcement different from a parent doing it, or the same thing on a bigger scale?"