To ask that DD (11) only uses the laptop in a communal area

[hillbilly]

She would rather take it to her room to do homework (year 7).I would rather she used it in a communal space. She says I don't trust her and that it's distracting to be in the kitchen. I say that one of the first pieces of internet safety advice is to use communal ares.

She does have trouble focusing and I suspect she is daydreams a fair bit when isolated in her room.

Am I being harsh or unreasonable?

Using communal areas is very sensible. I have that rule - nothing internet connected is allowed in their bedrooms. It was actually advised by my eldest child's school.
If I notice they've broken it I turn the wifi off for a few days - I'm the only one with 4G connection!

A very sensible rule, stick to your guns.

How about internet is only available in communao areas and if she goes upstairs you unplug and take the modem with you?

Thanks. She has an ipod which she uses in her room but does not have internet on it, only some games and spotify. I completely understand that her little brother aged 9 can be a distraction so I have asked that he does something quietly if she is in the kitchen doing homework.

Fleur - we don't have an upstairs, we live in a flat.

Same rule here for 12 year old son.
No phones iPads etc upstairs

That's the rule in our house. Same with their tablets. And when I let them have smartphones I will insist they're left downstairs overnight to charge. Quite aside from internet safety reasons, I think kids need a break from the constant bombardment of media drivel, friends bickering online and addictive games etc.

I think insisting on a communal area only works if there is a quiet communal area for her to use! We started with this rule but realized that expecting everyone else to be quiet was unreasonable, so homework is now done in bedrooms, but we pop up to check sometimes.

YANBU stick to your rules

I'm a shit mother! Laptop and smart phones are allowed in bedrooms here ... one of the Dcs had a potential 'groomer' but came and showed me straight away. I can (and do) check internet history so feel I can trust them until proven otherwise.

golfbuggy - herein lies the problem. Since we live in fairly close quarters, space is a issue. I want to avoid occupying DS with the tv while DD does homework as we generally don't have kids tv on Mon-Thurs (yes, I know, I'm a bundle of fun!) but since it's relatively recent that she needs ipad or laptop for homework (just started yr7), I want to set a precedent.

I would allow it for homework, I think. However I would want to see the homework and would want her to show me the browsing history - no deleting!

fabulously - that's the other side of the argument which I totally get and I don't want DD to think I don't trust her.

I think you are BU tbh. She's 11 and she wants to do her homework in a quiet place. Nothing wrong with that.

You are clearly showing a lack of trust.

I think the letting her have it in her room, but with the internet off is a good compromise.

itsallgoingtobefine - there is quite a lot of homework that requires internet access for school related sites and research.

ohnonotmybaby - I can see how it may look that way and yes I do understand that she needs a quiet space for hw.

Ah OK, I guess it comes down to how much do you trust her, and how internet savvy is she? Perhaps door open, and you keep popping in?

If you trust her what's the actual reason for this rule?

I would allow it at that age for homework too, but she would know I could check her browser history & she would be in trouble & wouldn't be allowed again if she was doing anything else but homework in that time.

She needs to be able to concentrate on homework & its not fair on her to have so many distractions.

I do think teaching them to use the internet safely & responsibly is far more useful than shadowing them all the time when in reality, that isn't always possible.

Assuming she has a phone, it's slightly a moot point, as she can access anything she wants on that when she's away from the house!

We have a subscription to Norton Family here, so while our house rules are that I can check devices at any time, we let our son have his PC, tablet and phone in his room.

The advantage of Norton Family is that it does monitoring for you, and can block some things that are not appropriate. It also sends a weekly report. DS soon forgot it was even running, and doesn't feel hard done by, and I have reassurance he's as sensible as I would hope him to be - I still glance over the reports, but I've not seen anything to concern me in the last few months.

RhiWrites - good question. I trust her (although getting her off devices at the weekend is painful), but she has form for doing minimum amount of HW. Maybe her being in the kitchen would mean I could keep an eye on how much she is doing? Maybe I'm just being over controlling? I honestly don'y know.

Tell me about norton family. Can I put it on all devices? Can it be overridden? My DS is quite savvy, he seems to download VPNs which allow him to bypass my router restrictions and metacert restricter

She does not have a smart phone just a little nokia for calls and texts. Yes, the point about allowing it and checking browser history is valid. Norton family sounds good too.