To be shocked that 97% of 12 years olds have smart phones?

I’m not surprised, every child round here has a phone for secondary (few can walk to school, and public transport isn’t reliable), and I’ve not seen any brick phones.

Most parents have smart phones and have done for years, most kids have a parents’ old phone with a cheap sim in it, as such have smart phones as pretty much every adult has had a smart phone for the last 10 years, so that’s what their old phone is.

Brick phones have to be specially bought.

How can they sign enforceable contracts when they are underage and likely unrepresented?

Whereabouts are you? That's really, really unusual. The school is deciding if a child can have a smartphone ? That's bonkers, do they come round your house and check?

They have to sign a contract with the school when they join saying they won’t have a smart phone until year 12 and they won’t have any social media accounts.

Lol

Like the school can control what they do in their spare time.

They have to sign a contract with the school when they join saying they won’t have a smart phone until year 12 and they won’t have any social media accounts.

I'm calling bullshit! There is absolutely no way that's true or even remotely enforceable.

My son is almost 12. Just started secondary (although SEN school). He has a dumb phone, which he got when he started 3 weeks ago. He has been amazing about it. He only needs it to let me or the childminder know when he is 10 minutes away so we can go to the bus stop to collect him. Otherwise, I'd not have got him one at all. He understands that smart phones can be addictive and that it is better for him to wait for now.

I really can't see any benefit to him from having access to a smart phone. If they need to do homework online then we can use a family laptop in the family areas to do work in (he doesn't, his school don't set things online). I don't need to track him, but if I did I'd just use a tracking device as opposed to a smart phone.

Schools here all insist on parents providing iPads.

The irony is that the phone signal is so bad here that if you are on a bus or something happens, you’d have to walk quite a way to even get a signal. I reckon it’s still 99.9% of independent 12 year olds who have a phone here though.

Surprised you're surprised too.

They have them for convenience, socialising (all plans made online) safety, school has apps for homework, timetable, messages.

Definitely normal once in high school in this day and age.

And all her friends have them too.

I'd say it's been the norm for DC at secondary schools to have smart phones for 8 or so years.

Only a minority of schools have "no phones" policies (it's way more common for the rule to be "off and out of sight"). There do seem to be more moving towards the full ban though, and if that proves to be an enduring policy taken up by more schools, then perhaps the numbers will fall back a bit.

But as second hand handsets are so readily available now (loads of people have a drawer of doom that contains at least one) and the costs are low, I think ownership will remain similar to current levels.

i’m not surprised.

My DD11 has since she was 9, but it's because she lives between 2 homes and likes to speak with me/her Dad without having to ask.
She has a tracker and takes it to school (for split homes) but turns it off when she gets there for the whole day, just turns it back on when she gets on the bus home.

I'm not remotely surprised. Most kids I know have a smartphone by P6 (age 10).

I suspect it jumps up at 12, 12 is year7, I imagine that's the threshold for a lot of parents, especially if they're getting to school independently.

The school has an app with the schedule and the homework on it. Teachers send messages through it. You just need an Iphone to get to the right classes…

Most children have their parents old phones from upgrading so yes most children will have a smart phone.

High schools where I live set homework through an app! Phones are sometimes used in class. I think kids that age would really struggle without one to be honest.

I'm not letting my son go 40 mins on a bus without having some way of getting hold of me so yes you are being ridiculously unreasonable.

I'm sure this is a significant social change - these days I think you're in the majority. But back in the mid-90s I was allowed, at age 12, to take a 40 minute bus ride to go shopping in town on my own, obviously without a phone. And my mum was widely considered to be ridiculously strict. I don't know what approach I'll take when my own dc is age 12, as I work with young people and from what I can see, the risks of having a phone are at least as great as the risks of not having a phone.

And I don't know a single child with a Nokia...they've all got smartphones for pretty much the same reason

My 10, 11 and 13 year old all have smartphones. They're second hand/hand me down. The 11 year old is at High school and does various clubs so needs it so I can stay in touch as he travels independently. He also has homework set on an app on it, and teachers make announcements and put up timetables on there. The older one is home educated so uses it to stay in touch with other home Ed kidd and uses various apps, takes photos etc. They youngest has one in case we pop out for a bit and leave him for an hour or two.

They all use them to talk to family on WhatsApp as well.

They need one to do their homework on.

They are quite common in secondary schools ds 2 doesn't take his to school but he is on sen school transport so it's door to door

You clearly know a very unrepresentative bunch of pre teens. Getting a phone before starting secondary is absolutely the norm if not earlier. That can possibly be shocking to anyone unless you have a ground level shockometer. I'm more surprised that its not 100%, school rules are irrelevant surely

I don’t know any tween who has a Nokia or dumb phone. They all have smartphones.