London, Sep 1 (IANS) Many schoolgoing children in Britain are carrying smartphones, laptops and iPads to their classrooms in place of traditional kit like pencil cases.
Only 16 percent of children now take a geometry set to school and just one in five packs a dictionary. But 68 percent of pupils own a mobile phone – and nearly half of them take it to school, The Sun reported.
The kids’ schoolbags can contain up to 1,000 pounds (over $1,620) worth of hi-tech gadgets.
According to the survey by online store Woolworths.co.uk, fourteen percent of mums and dads now take precaution of insuring their children’s schoolbags and their valuable contents.
Brand director Dan Rubel said: ‘Smartphones outsell maths geometry sets by 53 to 1.’
The popular BlackBerry costs around 149 pounds. A Kindle electronic reader would add 111 pounds to the value, a games console 169 pounds, an iPod another 169 pounds and a laptop computer 369 pounds.
That brings the total to 967 pounds if a child has all of them.
By contrast, the contents of an old-fashioned satchel – dictionary, geometry set, exercise book, calculator and pencil case – would cost 27 pounds.
