No phone for secondary school

We also made the mistake of thinking a phone wouldn’t be necessary. The high school very quickly corrected us. The phones are used (as others have said) for homework, for timetables, to take pictures in class (as directed) and a whole host of other things.

Yes, you could probably find other ways to do things, but it will be adding a lot of extra effort into each day.

Whg not just actively parent and teach them how to use their phones responsibly? It seems that you want to take the easy (for you) option by denying then the phone, but in doing so make things much harder for the child.

School has WiFi, my kids phones weren't expensive as they're hand-me-down iPhones and their bill is only £5 a month.

It's a pretty essential item for teenagers now to be able to socialise and keep in touch with friends, download bus tickets, pay for things with iPay, etc.

Nah I ain’t trading in my DD’s smart phone for a text-only one. The tracking apps, homework apps, messaging apps and security on it are far more vital than just being able to send a message

Dd's both started with an old handset of ours on a £6 or so a month rolling contract.

Dd1 uses her phone for her timetable, homework, bus ticket and reserving books at the library. Among other things. They have used them in classes to access quizzes and other resources.

Only social media is WhatsApp, and that won't change for a while.

'if'. That's wishful thinking unfortunately. Kids will come across phones, like it or not. They need the skills to deal with them.

It reminds me of my Nan in the 80’s who wouldn’t come into our kitchen when we got a microwave she was convinced it was a work of evil and that in a few years time people would have forgotten how to cook and hobs would be obsolete

No, brave new world is just 3 words clubbed together.

And I don’t think you know what dystopian means? Smart phones have been around for nearly 2 decades now. This terrified paranoia about them being ‘evil’ really isn’t very healthy

I also think this real palpable fear over the supposed harm smartphones can do needs to be managed a bit better. If you teach your child how to use the phone properly, locked it down to within an inch of its life and link it up to your own phone, and ban them having social media then their phone is largely a communication tool and I formation storing device. A full on set panic that the children will implode if they have iPhones is not especially healthy, and I always assume that people who think children will inevitably be harmed can’t be doing a great job of raising them if they have such little faith.

Technology is the future, we have to embrace it.

Brave New World describes a dystopia. Which is a pretty accurate description of a world where we give kids smart phones. Before that it was used by Shakespeare ironically, referring to evil. Again, pretty appropriate imo.

Do you HAVE to? No. Might it make your and their life easier? Yes.

Priorities...

By the sounds of it it would be a smart (pardon the pun) move to send them with a phone if the schools expect them to be able to do schoolwork using their phone.

What’s the worst that could happen?

Many schools will not allow phones to be whipped out in the corridor. Ours still issues paper planners to the kids. Yes, homework is issued online but my kid does it at home on a laptop. I’ve no idea how you get round the bus pass issue :)

But the whole point is that we need to wake up and accept that for young teens, the harms massively outweigh the benefits. Schools, parents, bus companies need to recalibrate their expectation that under 14s have smartphones.

Not everyone has the space or money for a computer. A smartphone can be as cheap as £60 or free if it's a hand me down. How much do laptops/computers go for with all the stuff they need? How do you share them between 3 kids?

DD also gets project homework sometimes like making a script between the 3 of them. They live in different towns and one of them is super busy so hard to meet up.Sure , they could use skype/teams but that's dependent on the other kids having a pc as well, having those apps,being able to use it when everyone else is free etc. Or they could do their parts and email each other with adjustments and ideas but that takes ages and it disrupts flow.

My son is in year 7 and has had a smartphone since he started there. It's a requirement of his grammar school. That or a tablet or laptop to do research on in classes.

I got the phone purely so that I knew where he was on his way to and from school. I use the google family link app.

The phone is locked down. He is unable to access any apps other than the ones I grant him to use. No social media of any kind.

It's a contract phone so he can call or text but the only numbers he has are his parents and grandparents and he knows how to call the emergency services.

The phone is placed on charge the moment he gets home and he only picks it up again when he leaves for school.

It's half term here so he hasn't touched it since he broke up. He has no desire to either.

I'm keeping it that way for as long as possible. Wish me luck!

Also given that school children use their phones to chat to each other outside of school and to arrange social activities, any year 7 without a phone is going to be left out socially.

The whole smartphone-free movement is about collective action. It only works if other like-minded people are doing it. If there are other kids using text or old-fashioned telephone calls this problem disappears.

Only if you behave like a prick and misuse it.

Even pre lockdown, I'd expect year 7 pupils to have a phone. I'm in my early 30s and when I was finishing my A-levels, all the year 7 pupils I tutored/helped with extra curriculars in school had phones.

OP, this is exactly why you will probably have to be much more flexible in your thinking regarding your child having a smartphone.

You say repeatedly that there is no compelling argument for it, but what will you do if you come up against this, or your child needs a phone in order to get on the school bus, assuming that's how they will travel to school? These things are increasingly done by use of an app. Increasingly so are school timetables, which can vary week to week. Do you really expect your child to whip out a laptop in the corridor each time something needs to be checked? Or should they be the only one who won't know about a change of room because their classmates have phones and they don't?

Sorry, but I am not sure that your "no convincing argument for" really stacks up.

Technology isn't going to go away. The days when homework was written down in a rough book or paper planner have almost totally gone now. You are living in the past if you expect them to"just write it down during the lesson" because it generally isn't done that way anymore and is provided via the apps. You could well come a cropper on that one very quickly if you refuse to provide your child with a suitable phone.

It doesn't have to be enormously expensive, you can check it and you can put parental controls on it.

I also think parents who smugly announce their DC won’t be getting a Smart Phone until they’re well into secondary should consider thar their child will miss out on arrangements and days out with friends. Kids just want an easy life if they’re arranging to go into town etc they do it via chat groups, and are not inclined to message their friends’ mums. if your kid isn’t contactable unless it’s through you, they will miss out. I mean if you’re ok with that more power to you, but your child may not be.

You're losing me a bit here now. Apologies if I've gotten lost along the way. Clearly, nobody would advocate for phones or earphones in a teaching/classroom environment. That would be entirely counterproductive.

She did actually try to speak to the school about giving the homework in class, but they were having none of it!

What actually swayed my friend was that she and her husband agreed neither of them would spend an extra voluntary 4 hours a week at work, if it could be avoided by downloading an app.

My DD is in year 6 and she has my old smartphone. It was cheaper than buying even a brick phone because it was free.

She has a smartphone for a few reasons:

• She walks home and I can use a tracking app to check where she is. Her messages are also shared on my phone so I can ensure No one dodgy is messaging her. Can’t get that on a Nokia.
• She has started to make arrangements with her friends without my help. For example they arrange to walk to school, go to the park, go swimming, meet at the shops etc. this means their friends who don’t have phones or smartphones aren’t included because they aren’t contactable
• She uses apps, browsers etc to do her homework. She has an iPad too for this but often she will use both in conjunction. Can’t do that on a Nokia
• Shes 10 going on 11 and likes to take pictures of her and her friends and I fully encourage this as so much may change come September and I want her to have lovely memories with many people to look back on.