Kids and WhatsApp

[Curiouscucumber]

Has anyone got a preteen that has a phone but doesn't have WhatsApp? I am worried by not letting my 11 year old have WhatsApp, I'll be creating social issues for them. Equally, I've heard some things about nasty WhatsApp groups and want to protect them from that.

My 11yo has fairly recently got a phone. He has a WhatsApp group with his three closest friends in and as parents we have all agreed to supervision and the kids have agreed that no one else is to be added to the group without agreement from kids and parents.

I'm hoping it starts to teach him responsible phone usage before we hit the peer pressure of secondary. Its working OK so far- they can play Minecraft together and make daft videos, not feeling like they're being left out of anything. There is a wider class group but so many issues have come from it DS isn't interested at the moment.

My son uses the Stars app - it’s like WhatsApp but for kids and you have to have the person’s username/code to add them. No phone numbers. So much easier to control who they can contact.

Dts are y7, but v young for the year late august bday, so still 11. They have had WhatsApp since they got phones in y6. It is monitored heavily by me. Their school has banned whole class groups, they happen but I just delete them.

DH is a secondary teacher, bullying over WhatsApp is a real problem.