To feel relieved the school has now completely banned phones

They will probably end up having to introduce some measures to ensure children don't use them at school as the responsibility is now the schools to ensure the kids don't use them.

We had this rule previously and so did my sons school. The problem is they sneak them into the toilets and use them there.

I think if a school is going to ban phones entirely, they should be reinstating a pay phone and for there to be phones at train stations, bus stations etc.

I didn't call my parents for everything in the 90s, but most people I knew had a BT card that would charge the call to your parents phone bill. I would have called if I knew I'd need permission for something or I knew that it would be a significant worry and I wasn't going somewhere with a landline.

Would be happy for my kids to have a dumb phone that was switched off and there for emergency use. Not a huge fan of tracking my kids or that my eldest seems permanently attached to his screen. The new school rules have meant they get less time on an already very short lunch break to go and collect phones. Not sure that dumb phones would have the same level of disruption or require the same safe keeping.

My kid has just started y7 and has a basic Nokia. She wants a smartphone and I'm assuming she will want one even more as so many of the kids have it. I don't like how much they're on their phones to and from school, but I like knowing she has the phone to call or text me if she needs to. I wouldn't support a complete ban.

I remember several times calling my Mum from a phone box or reversing the charges when I had trouble getting home from school. We also had a student payphone in the school we could use during breaks/lunch.

There's no phone boxes between home and my daughter's school. It's not the same.

People talk as if the only option is either no phone or an iPhone with full unfettered access to the internet and Snapchat, tiktok, YouTube etc in a child’s pocket.

Let’s be real about this - this issue is social media and to some extent unfettered access to the internet / YouTube etc, not phones generally. A map app, the option to text a parent, a bus pass are all useful and in no way damaging. There are more clever dumbphones out there with simplified screens and no social media but they are not exactly sweeping the nation and a lot of research is needed by only the most determined parents to find something that ticks all these boxes for their teen. The DEFAULT should be no unfettered internet and no social media. It shouldn’t be something we parents have to research, tweak multiple settings etc in order to achieve. We need to shout louder to the tech companies, (Meta) who incidentally have been found liable of deliberately manipulating children’s algorithms for financial gain, and Apple et al. If you don’t produce a straightforward teen phone which gives our children access to the stuff they NEED and not any of the damaging stuff then we will find alternatives ourselves and you will lose our custom. SmartphoneFreeChildhood have done a lot of this work already.

This. It's not like these kids are going to be calling up mummy at 20/30/40 if they miss a bus 😂

I don't think there is any law saying children can't be left alone.

But I get what your trying to say, it's no longer socially acceptable to have a latch-key kid.
Yet as soon as they hit secondary people seem to think its fine for them to be walking 3miles without any ability to contact people.

My 15 year old walks 40mins to school and back. I don't track her. Her sister just started the same at 11 no plans to track her either she does have a phone but neither or my kids have been particularly interested in them us ethen to arrange meet ups with freinds /play games. School have pouches for Yr7 new this year. In primary they walked 20mins there are back on their own from Yr5 to 9 or 10. I'm amazed on mumsnet by how madly overprotective people are on Mumsnet. I work in the charity sector around violence against women and girls so very aware of risk and a lot of these tech things give false belief in protection and mean kids grow up not learning to do their own risk assessments

What law would this be?

My 10 year olds and all their friends walk home on their own. Mine have a key to let themselves in. They get back 3.30pm and I'm back 4.15pm.

They don't have phones. When they turn 11 they will be getting brick phones. I don't agree with kids having smart phones.

When they go out they are told what time they need to be back and thats what time they get back.

There is no law regarding 10 year olds and after school care.

I think it's a complete King Cnut-style response to the matter. Over the past nearly 20 years, smartphones have become an everyday part of life and depended on for so many different functions. Even the word 'phone' is a gross understatement of what they are actually required for nowadays.

It's the same with the internet in general, whereby modern society as we know it would collapse if we suddenly switched it off and stopped using it. So many old-fashioned things have now been done away with, because they're just obsolete and no longer needed now we can do them much more efficiently with the internet.

Because they weren't willing or able to address the specific issues and just said "Phones bad for teenagers!", they're now having to find retro alternatives that are less convenient and more onerous, rather than acknowledge that smartphones ARE essential, but they need to be sensibly controlled and those who have problems with them helped, guided and properly disciplined.

The logic of some posters is pretty funny here.
A child age 10 legally needs before and after school care, but come age 11 they can magically go off for hours by themselves, do anything and everything and dont need any way to get in contact with parents or anyone else?
I think these posters are telling porkies about the 80s and 90s because they feel some bizarre need to feel superior. Its weird, honestly.

Somehow I think this is just a quick easy line to virtue signal how much better you think you are than the rest of the population.

So, there were no payphones in East London in the 80s and 90s.
I totally believe you. 😚

At school? No. Before and after school? Yes.

Is there nothing in your own life that you value the convenience and utility of, which you could manage without, but would prefer not to have to?

Are you a driver with your own car? If so, how would you respond if several people who live on your street had been caught speeding, drink-driving or driving without insurance, so your local council somehow brought in a by-law that everybody with a home on your street was banned from owning or driving a car anymore "Because the people who live on Acacia Avenue have clearly shown that they can't use cars safely and appropriately" ?

If that was the case, I'm sure you're a law-abiding person, and so you would comply fully... but would you really just shrug and say "Well, I can still get the bus or taxis to work, to the shops, socialising; and people historically used to have horses and carts or cycle or walk everywhere, and they managed OK... so I've got nothing to be upset or annoyed about" ?

FWIW I dont actually think total bans to and from school are sensible.
But I work in a school and see the issues phones cause. If kids kept them off and in their bags, there wouldn't be an issue and bans wouldn't be needed. Parents moan about phones being confiscated, rather than making sure their child isn't on TikTok in maths. Every parent seems to think their child is the exception, or thinks its fine because they only use their phone in class occasionally....
Schools know kids will still bring phones in. There isn't the capacity to police a complete ban.

Sometimes you don’t know you need it until you need it though.

I do think most children going straight to school and back and therefore won’t need it but as soon as you factor other things in it becomes hard.

i wouldn’t be able to go to work without mine, for one thing wouldn’t be able to be guaranteed to use my laptop due to authentication.

granted most 11/12 year old won’t need to do most things that I use it for in a day but a 16 year old may

Our high school isn’t banning, I don’t think many are locally in our area. They are keeping the same rule they have had for years; phones not to be used anywhere on school grounds and if seen using the phone is confiscated until the next day.

Didnt need to use them though

Yes you’re more likely not to be mugged if you aren’t carrying a phone

If your child has indeed always following the rules, and is now surviving a blanket ban, then he obviously does not need his phone at school. So why on earth are you so upset about it?

There is so much that we need phones for these days that I think banning it can make life difficult. Not so bad if you live really close but if you go direct from school to somewhere else it could be very difficult.