I've just seen the most depressing thing

I saw a dad pushing his daughter for at least half an hour on the swing whilst the girl was watching something on the phone. I did find it very strange but of course I know nothing about them/their day. However the only time I argue with my DP is about the amount of screen time or sweets he gives to our DCs. He usually resorts to the easiest/least dramatic option especially with our younger DC

Parents have always found ways to ignore their children. Long before mobile phones my dad used gardening to get away from us kids and my mum read books/listened to radio 4. You may think phones are the scourge of the earth but I can promise you that kids all over the world were being emotionally neglected before they were invented.

ok, but my kids schools and their friends school does, and tell them to keep the parents updated.

No I'm sorry but that just isn't true. Can you imagine the carnage of leaving it up to 11/12 year olds to organise these things. Didn't happen.

ok, but my kids schools and their friends school does, and tell them to keep the parents updated.

Kids are supposed to have ownership of their own homework and own school emails. I get emails too, but I don't get a copy of all the emails my kids receive (they obviously don't get mine either, school doesn't inform them of the many little payments popping up all the time 😄)

When my kid go on a sport competition on a school day, the school leave it to children to inform parents when they are leaving and when they are arriving for pickup. Without phone, I wouldn't know if my kid was back at 4pm or 7pm.

It's pretty standard?

what's telling? That I don't have kids who just sit down quietly looking around for 30mn? They absolutely do not have to do that at school!

My youngest child would absolutely not have sat looking quietly around for 30 mins at age 3. I could have handed her my phone but instead I took a bag with me that had toys, books, colouring in things and had to engage with her to keep her seated.

She did have some screen time at home when she was a bit older but never outside when she had the opportunity to take in her surroundings and engage with things going on. Also...

From year 7 (the first year of Secondary school), the school EXPECT them to have a smart phone, it's very difficult and awkward to access what they need without one: homework list, payment and funds for lunch, list of those picked up to join the teams, contacting parents, taking photos of schedule and sending them to parents*

I have never known a secondary school message any pupils on their phones. It's always the parents the school contacts. It's me who is contacted with all that stuff not my DC.

Wow - really ? An advert in London telling parents to speak to their kids ??

wow.

and as a parent, I maintain that if tech was limited to laptops, half the problem would disappear.

Kids and teens aren't stupid, they know how to download apps, they have older siblings and most parents are not tech savy enough to even notice what app they have, and how they've hidden them.

School want kids to have smart phones, kids use them. Everyone is on whatsapp these days, raising the age limit is pointless

Unfortunately schools have been sold this technology as time saving and easier for everyone. There was a huge push on technology in the lockdown years and a lot of it stayed around. Some useful and some not.

As a pp said the tech companies are to blame with their lack of concern for the societal impacts. It would be great to pare back the use of smartphones and digital technology to 11s onwards so that children's brain and motor development stand a chance.

It sounds like outcry by an older generation but I am not that old and have seen the impact increasing over the last ten years, it is stark and you wonder why no one is doing anything to stop it.

Then I spotted an advertisements on a bus shelter in London telling parents to speak to their children which acknowledges there is an issue that needs to be tackled by everyone.

Indeed, kids leaving the classroom to maintain their ‘streak’ take a selfie in the loo,
bully other kids, worrying that they’ve been excluded from the group chat on snap take up a huge amount of school time, and contribute to kids heads not being in the education game during school hours -
it’s a really hard one for them to manage
the amount of communication I’ve seen from schools about kids accessing stuff online inappropriately, the bullying, using apps they aren’t old enough to consent to etc ..
Schools are massively struggling with this
they are trying to walk the line beween using tech for good but not perpetuating the problems this brings

then which is it?

We encourage kids to have smartphone, meaning accessing all the features on them, or complain that parents give them smartphone and the kids use them? 😂

At least people who want smartphone to be banned for under 16 - and at worst back to the old Nokia, are consistent.

A parent distracting his preschool child for 20mn with a screen, big deal. If the kid was stuck in front of a tv screen on the wall in the same shop, it would be the same.

Oh goodness what a stretch, no one has suggested turn back the clock and go all PC rather than smartphone -
of course the smartphone / apps are fantastic tools that kids need to be able to utilise

see above - sensible people are referencing social media and dopamine enhancing / addictive elements of smartphones as problematic
there is a difference between the utility of a child accessing a smartphone for school / apps and a 3 year old watching IG reels !

what "help" do modern parents have?

You could use modern resources with a computer, no one is forcing schools to select apps that only work on phones, apps that are needed during the day and make it very awkward and difficult for the one child who doesn't have a smart phone.

I am not "blaming" schools, but can we be honest about the reality of a life as an 11 year old child? (11 year old because things are still a bit different in Primary, at least until year 5 and 6)

A lot of research re rock music in the 50’s and 60’s ???

hardly comparable to the research we have seen in recent years pulling on neuroscience/ psychology/ behavioural science etc etc

blimey in that era women were admitted to psychiatric hospitals for ‘loose morals’ !!!

look at some recent RCT’s mid career researcher - you will find it illuminating!!

Most modern parents have less help! Really?

I love that when I am responding to the points posters made, I am the one accused to be the one far away from the thread, because you don't agree.

and my point about the schools was that, it's not personal, it's about all the kids there.

It's not about me "being ok" and looking at the reality of the world we are in now, and the schools do have a role in it.

No, I’ve got school age not adult kids
which have grown up with the smartphones and have had access like all their peers,
But I am not oblivious to the impact screens have on psychological and social development and in particular mental health -
being a burnt out parent using a phone to support your parenting is more likely to mean your kids have difficulties that are going to contribute to you being burnt out !!
it’s just a temporary fix to being burnt out, buys a bit of time, gives a bit of dopamine,
but the problems don’t go away …
and staring into the screen isn’t going to resolve the problems….

Because it's neglectful and cruel.