What are your rules with screens?

[PurpleLily7]

DC 12 and 14. Completely stuck to looking a their phones - literally all the time if they could. 12 year old in particular is a total addict and when not allowed to have phone or PS4, is at a loss as to what to do and wanders about aimlessly and irritable.
I know it's our fault as parents that we've let it get to this stage. We used to have a rule that they were allowed one hour of screen time on school days and then three hours at the weekend. But that's just gone out of the window now that they are on WhatsApp groups with their friends etc.
So...I'd love to hear some ideas from other parents as to how you manage the wretched screens.
The only thing we've managed to stick to is phones are left in the kitchen at 8pm for the 12yo and 9pm for the 14yo.

None now they are in year 10 and 11. They make their own decisions when they are on there with the following which they agreed to with us.

they have to come off when they are told (meal times, too late at night)

the screen has to be in the main living area and not in their bedrooms

if we want to watch something together as a family

school cats so they're not allowed their phones in their rooms?

DD is 13.5 and I impose a 2 hour daily screen time limit through Apple’s family sharing, that is for Instagram, WhatsApp, safari etc., etc.. weekends and weekdays are the same unless it’s a school break.

I allow Apple Music, the digital county library, face time, phone calls and text/iMessages unlimited.

Unfortunately she can’t self regulate and would lose her life to her phone if I didn’t restrict it.

If she has done her homework and the things she needs to do at home I grant another 90 mins.

Lose her life to her phone - that's exactly it.

What we need, I think, is some sort of thing that stops them using phones after a certain amount of time. Turning off wifi won't help as they have 4G on the phones.

school cats so they're not allowed their phones in their rooms?

Yes, sorry I was thinking of the playstation because they are sitting in the same room as me playing on it now.

If you are on apple family sharing you can restrict what you want to/allow what you want to for certain periods or unlimited. It has every option you need and is free. There are other apps you can buy and a friend who is not iOS subscribes fo something for £6 a month from memory.

You can also set downtime, DD’s is from 10pm until 7am so even if she hasn’t used her time the phone stops useage during that window.

Obviously DD would prefer that it wasn’t restricted but 🤷🏻‍♀️, who cares?

She knows that if she had done everything that should have been done there wouldn’t be any limits.

Screens for all come to my room at 9pm. One of my dds is in her GCSE year and the other in year 9.
We’ve had a very relaxed approach to the amount of time they spend on screens overall particularly as all their homework/coursework is set and submitted online now but keeping them in their rooms overnight is a no no. Equally important is having screen free time for a good hour or so before bed.
Annoyingly, their friends ping messages across to them all through the night and the notifications flash up from their little spot in my room, making it look like Blackpool illuminations If they forget to disable notifications
This really highlights to me how much time teens are spending on their phones and devices all through the night and makes me glad I’m strict about them not having them when they’re meant to be sleeping.

The nighttime is not a problem (yet) as the handing in of phones at 8pm and 9pm respectively is set in stone.

But the daytime use...and weekends...honestly they are nose to screen the WHOLE TIME. Especially the 12yo who has lost the art of knowing how else to spend his time. He does two activities in the week but weekends are 'free' and just go by with him looking at his phone and me trying (admittedly halfheartedly as it's so hard) to tempt him into doing something else.
Anyway homework has really started to suffer so clearly we need a much more structured and strict system.

One last bump in case anyone else can suggest anything. Thanks.

I've never restricted ds using his phone & tablet. He is 15 & pretty good at self regulating himself. He switches his phone to do not disturb around 9.00pm, then he reads books he has downloaded or listens to audio books or podcasts until he falls asleep. It is his GCSE year this year & he has had a new tablet & keyboard for christmas, he chooses to do a lot of his homework on it instead of his laptop.

DS11 is the same - not able to entertain himself without it.

We use Google family link and Nintendo switch parental controls to restrict time. I find I have to get him off the phone before he'll entertain the thought of something else and then having an activity or two planned and set up (like you would for a 5yo) starts him off and then he will actually self start a bit. It's exhausting though and I find I resent having to set things up for him because at his age he should be able to manage!

He has to do jobs in the house and homework too. Screen tone not dependent on this as such but

With WhatsApp it still comes out of hours time. He has to save some time if he wants to continue checking WhatsApp throughout the day. We are currently working on not just using it all in a binge as soon as he wakes up and then moaning around the house bored.

Dunno what I was going to say after the but.

Sounds exactly like my DS Bertie!

My dd is a bit younger (Y7) and she has a hard limit (via Apple family sharing) of two hours per day on her phone, with nothing before 6.30 or after 20.30. Calls and texts and bus app excluded from that, as I want her to access those in an emergency if needed. Phone charges downstairs overnight. No apps that’s shes too young for (so no WhatsApp, as that’s from 16 now).

It still buzzes away all evening (downstairs) with iMessage groups and texts, but that is partly because her friends have been in different time zones over the holidays, and partly just other kids have more access.

This seems to be working so far. Plus she knows that the consequence of frittering away time on her phone rather than doing other stuff will bite her, not me (eg school sanctions for not doing homework, dance teacher cross if she’s late to class).

I often raise the time limit in the holidays, as I think a few lazy days with lots of screen time are fine, as long as there’s nothing else she should be doing. And I have chores ready if she says she’s bored!

What I worry about is the constant notifications, I mean constant from various apps when they're watching a video on insta about 100 notifications are coming up and they're switching to them all because it's all instant they are losing their patience to stick to a simple task.

I go into settings periodically and block notifications for most apps. Or we do it together. He's not old enough IMO to judge whether a notification is useful vs a nuisance.