How old for social media?

[Acloserlook]

My child is y6, is this too young for Fb?

FB has a minimum age limit of 14.

Year 6 is far too young.

In my opinion, too young....Fb age limit is 13 I think so my 10 and 11 year olds do not have it or any other social media. I intend to keep it that way for as long as possible. Too many horrors recently.

Thanks ... all the kids seem to have it so I didn’t want to be the one who said no!

Yes too young.

Don’t know anyone under 18 on FB

All da yoof on Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter

I let my DS on Insta at 12, Snapchat & Twitter at 13

DD currently 11 and don’t want her having any of them for as long as possible

Put it off as long as you can, bitter voice of experience!
Even 13 is too young, not sure how I would have handled it but it's a nightmare.

As long as you can keep them away

She won’t be having any social media til she meets their age restriction criteria. I couldn’t give a crap if I am that one parent who says no.

Thanks. How you do enforce it if they set up an account anyway?

Why don’t you want to be the one who says no?

Do you care more about being a cool mum, or your child’s emotional and mental wellbeing?

Restrictions are set up on phones so any app they want has to get approval

so I didn’t want to be the one who said no!

But that's a bit silly, isn't it? Do/will you say the same about other activities and issues (alcohol/parties/unsupervised trips)?

Be the one that says no.

Kids have it at 6?!?? My god

Year 6, so 10/11.

Most have it by the end of year 6. I stood firm until DD was 12.5.

You have to make sure Snapchat is in ghost mode or something, so their location isn’t given.

I don’t know, I don’t understand it. (Which is the real reason I didn’t let her have it if I’m honest but i’m not telling DD that).

Oh I monitored until they were in Year 10. When they got to 15 I didn’t want to know.

I reserve the right to pick up any gadget, at any time and they have to give me access. (I hope the threat of this is enough as I don’t want to look. It feels intrusive, but I don’t want To see the crap their friends post). Mine are 15/16 now so rules have been instilled I hope.

Not about being a cool mum. I just don’t want them left out.

If I was in charge it would be banned from anyone under the age of 16 and only accessible once they had passed some sort of common sense test. I would apply it to phones with cameras too. (Sort of lighthearted...)

It is OK to be the one who says no.

DS is 11 and is on a WhatsApp group with close friends but no other social media. He plays online on Xbox, again with close friends (who he knows in RL) which we monitor closely.

Last year in yr6 I was hearing a lot of reports from other parents about problems with bullying over Intagram/Snapchat, particularly among the girls in his class.

And recently I was talking to a friend who is a mental health nurse - seeing a lot of young people in crisis/attempted suicide, main cause being online bullying. Horrible

I let dd1 when she started high school, and that was only because she was going to a different school to her friends and it helped her keep in touch.
She is 15 now and very trustworthy, she knows the basis of having it is that I can look through it whenever I like, and we often do together.
There can be some scary things on there, once we had to get police involved as she was receiving messages from someone claiming to be a boy at school but was actually a man stalking young girls, he was known to the area and a lot of the girls at dds school were contacted. Luckily dd told me right away, which has led to me trusting her a lot more.
There are also some awful videos etc on facebook which aren't suitable for younger children.

There’s a good website giving advice on this:

www.thinkuknow.co.uk/

It doesn’t matter how responsible your child is, they can find themselves at real risk of harm from online activities even if they’re sitting in their own bedrooms, unless they’re given the right boundaries and advice, appropriate to their age, and the right supervision. FB is 13+

I just don’t want them left out

That was why my brother & SIL relented & allowed my niece to get FB before she was 13. All her pals had it & they'd use group chat to arrange things and forget about her. It was set up with very strict rules and privacy settings & she knows that it can get checked any time by her parents

Yes, that was my concern red

i just don’t want them left out

This attitude is why there’s a race to the bottom with these things. It’s so completely depressing.

I would like to see a cultural campaign - propaganda if you like - aimed at parents, something like the “Just Say No” campaign of yore, about social media use, if only to give parents like the OP ballast when saying “not yet, wait another year or two” to their children.

Kids don’t understand the repercussions of their social media use, and they can’t be expected to. Parents have to be in charge.

I’ve had a Facebook account for years and nothing dramatic has happened it isn’t a demon