Tablets / portable DVDs for pre-schoolers?

[suddenlycupishalffull]

My eldest starts Reception in September, my youngest is a toddler. I feel like they get more than enough screen time - the elders watches CBeebies while we're all getting ready in the morning, on pre-school full days perhaps a film before dinner as he's usually exhausted and very occasionally he'll play one of the CBeebies games on my iPad during what was naptime to give him a bit of downtime. I've noticed his cousins, one of whom is the same age, all have tablets and are playing games competently, whereas I have to still tell him to tap the cross to close, swish this way to move the page etc. They also have personal DVDs players for long car journeys. Am I being a dinosaur here? Is it reasonable for modern kids to have these gadgets at this age?

????

I would say its reasonable yes, but then I'm still pretty young myself and so its a huge part of my own life and I got the gadgets as and when they came out.

DD is 4 and just started school this week. She had an ipad from about age 3 but we recently got the new kindle instead as I think its much better for kids. She can use it all herself and her profile only has kids stuff on it, instead of the ipad and my itunes.

Its pretty much hers to do as she wishes, and because its not limited or a "forbidden fruit" as such, she uses it like most of the other things she enjoys, when she feels like it.

Yes. Screens are part of the modern world and as such children need to know how to use them.

They will have a lot of exposure to them at school/nursery anyway. Really don't see how tablets and the like are necessary for pre-schoolers.

Hamiltoes could you link to the kindle? I'd be really interested in that.

I read books on my kindle and I love my iPad, to be honest that's why I've hesitated for the 4 year old as I could quite happily be on the iPad and wasn't sure if he had a tablet whether I'd have to be introducing screen time controls. I wasn't sure if they'd have access to tablets at school my school had to photocopy text books and I didn't have an email account till Uni!

It's not unreasonable to have them, it's fine if you don't.

It's personal choice. My eldest dcs have had (preowned) ds/dsi consoles since they turned 4. They are 6 and 7 years old and got a galaxy kids tab for their last birthdays, my almost 5 year old would break it in five minutes but she has an innotab which is more robust.

I was resistant at first as tablets can be so expensive and we can't afford to replace them, no way could we afford ipads, but as pp have said technology is a huge part of school life now and not just in the "I've got more than you" as it was when I was in school ten years ago. My ds started to learn simple coding last year (year 2) which I only touched on in year 11!

Imo it's important that kids are able to use tabs and laptops/pcs but they don't necessarily need their own, having access to one and learning to use it is enough, the only reason mine have their own is that I got fed up of the arguments over mine.

Coding in year 2?!!

Personal choice. They're not missing out if they don't have electronics.
Both my husband and I are hardcore IT programmers and certified geeks. So if it's new, techy and gadgety, we've got it. Our 5 year old has her own tablet. She plays appropriate games and is a wizz at Minecraft. She's also learning some uber basic coding (not text based). That said, the amount of time spent often irritates the shizzit out of me. DH seems less worried though. I reckon it's unnecessary, but my daughter is very interested.

There's plenty of evidence that too much screentime is bad for children generally, and that very young children's development is hindered rather than helped by playing on tablets etc instead of talking and playing with real objects.

They can do both