To not allow my almost 11 yo a mobile phone

I teach this age group. They have told me so many stories about how they can get around parental controls and dummy accounts and apps. If they put as much effort into their schoolwork we'd be amazing.Most of them admitted to putting false ages in sm accounts (which effects the algorithm and the people they connect you with) and a few had chatted online with strangers who said they were kids.

None of their parents knew about these things.

My DD (11) won't be getting a smart phone for a good few years. She'll get a brick when she starts secondary.

I struggle to have a healthy relationship with my phone, so it's unfair to expect my DD, with her developing brain, to manage any better. She does have a Chromebook with emails, but not social media or WhatsApp.

We have friends with similar approaches to us, so although DD feels left out, she's not the only one in this position.

@AliceMcK sorry, was just using those as generic examples not specifically what is restricted/banned for us. I agree, tiktok is a cesspit.

There's more and more parents becoming aware of the issues around having phone too young. We are very fortunate that we are in the same mind frame as majority of the parents of our children's friends and the pressure is off for us thankfully.

There is a certain degree of virtue signalling in not allowing phones - an equivalent of "we don't have a tv" from not so distant past.
You can't escape tech. You need to be equipped how to deal with challenges.

Your daughter is generation alpha. Phones are a big part of their lives now whether you like it or not. As long as you teach her how to keep herself safe and put restrictions in place, she'll be fine.

Completely agree. That “what the hell were they thinking” moment is already happening with parents wondering why others gave their kids access to smartphones so young.

No one’s to blame. No one could foresee the shit show it would cause but the damage to kids is now clear - so it’s time to make a change.

I’m not convinced delaying giving her a phone will have much impact on this. I struggle a lot with being glued to a phone and smartphones weren’t even in existence when I started secondary school. Your son would likely have the same issues even if you’d waited a couple of years longer.

This. Just because you get them a phone doesn't mean you're automatically opening the gates to Mordor. My 14 and 12 yr olds both have a smart phone. Full parental controls, timers, no access to social media or youtube, whatsapp is permitted but only groups allowed are with family members (and it's set so that they can't be auto added to any groups).

We had an interesting discussion this week around Duolingo, one of them said they liked learning a language but it was finding it too addictive so deleted it himself. I do think once they're a bit older (admittedly maybe not as young as 11) they need to learn how to manage healthy habits around tech.

DS14 (Yr10) has friends who still don't have any phone, and DS12 (Yr7) I reckon a third of his year are phone free. Any child who says "but everyone has one" is usually lying...

DS is 11 and gets annoyed with the amount of messages he gets on his at times, just groups with friends from school and his sports teams. It has meant that he's learned it's ok to turn it off and walk away from it, that he doesn't need to answer immediately.

There are limits and controls on there, he knows he has no privacy when it comes to having his messages checked by us so he shouldn't send anything he doesn't want anyone else to see.

He did end up sending a message with the word 'shit' in it instead of 'shot' and came to tell me straight away, which was nice of him.

Or the children who are playing out are not the ones you’d want your children playing with 😬 our old area the only children our where the children of the druggies who wanted them out their hair. Ours then had to be kept in.

New area and just pretty much no children out we have a large park field football pitch I can see from my windows and it’s mostly empty all the time.

My 11yo has a smartphone but no social media/WA or internet browser. He can call and text but isn’t currently interested.

We use Google Family link so everything is very restricted up to the age of 13, so that works for us for now. Any app has to be approved by you.

I personally didn’t want to go as far as a brick phone as I didn’t want him standing out at secondary.

Fact: There are no positives to having a smart phone at this age.

I regret giving my teens phones at 11 and wish I had waited (they have all the parental controls).

I wish I had given mine basic Nokias for communication purposes only.

FWIW, one of DS12’s friends doesn’t have a phone (Year 7) and is not left out at all. The more people who do it, the more normal it will become and the more likely we are to get away from this awful scourge.

Its depressing that you can't say just go outside and play when there are no other kids to play with. All cooped up indoors or far away.

This is the most terrible logic I have heard all day. Why an earth would you bring the temptation in when the child isn’t even interested? Should the OP start buying weed, fags and vodka too and leaving porn around the house?

Don’t assume she will be ostracised for not having a smart phone. Growing numbers of kids don’t, especially in the current year 6 cohort as they head off to secondary school. My daughter is in year 7, has a Nokia flip and a number of her friends have the same. As a result there hasn’t been an odd one out feeling about it. Her homework requires access to a computer and the internet, but not a smartphone. Take a look at the smartphone free childhood website to understand the issues and they provide info on a range of alternatives.

Exactly this. No parent will endorse succumbing to peer pressure unless it’s about something as harmful as phones. Madness!

@JazbayGrapes neither was I 🤣 but I guess your point is that they aren’t using social media to arrange to socialise but rather social media is their socialising? That’s chronically depressing if true and makes me more determined to hold back on smartphones and social media so DD can learn to function in the physical world first

well, kids that age aren't exactly playing outside all the time until streetlamps come up anymore

@PuppiesProzacProsecco im curious why you allow TikTok but not Facebook? Facebook hardly has anything on it and is not popular with kids at all these days where as TikTok has far more disturbing stuff that is harder to control. TikTok is one thing we absolutely don’t allow.

I’m still not seeing anyone explain what ‘socialisation’ 11 and 12 year old children are missing out on by not having smartphones? Are kids that young really being allowed to organise their own social lives with little/no parental input?

Mine managed to buy himself a second secret smartphone at 14. While he pestered us for the "newest and coolest", turns out an old beat up android on payg was good enough for nightly snapchatting and whatever.

Weep yes, but a lot of it is making me angry too.

A lot of abdication of parental responsibility-

I wish I could
I wish I hadn't
I dont want my child to resent me
I have no choice
The horse has bolted etc
It's too hard
I gave in

Hard to read actually.

👆

Dumb phone at 15.