Is dd too young for this??

[malificent7]

Dd 9 ( year 5) has a boyfriend. Ge sounds lovely . He gave her a crisp, gave up his chair for her in assembly and grld open a door. This is all very cute.

Trouble is they text on instagram. Whilst i remember having crushes in y5 there was no such thing as instagram or texting.

Im just worried that she is too young to be forming such strong bonds and I dont want her to get hurt. All texts are read by me and very innocent.
I wish she was a bit more into her books and less into boys!

This online guidance on Instagram is quite misleading in my view, it talks a lot about what your DC puts on instagram, and the danger of over sharing etc, but makes no reference to what they could see posted publicly by any adult on the planet!:

<a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.connectsafely.org/wp-content/uploads/instagram_guide.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjrkILAvJ3ZAhWICMAKHRyIAXsQFjALegQICRAB&usg=AOvVaw2QxtA3t3SnSD7SO8BYtwkD" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.connectsafely.org/wp-content/uploads/instagram_guide.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjrkILAvJ3ZAhWICMAKHRyIAXsQFjALegQICRAB&usg=AOvVaw2QxtA3t3SnSD7SO8BYtwkD

The implication is that, there's only a problem if the child messes up, which is quite wrong IMO :-(.

IMO allowing children to have social media when they are too young, means that you are teaching them that if they don't like the rules, they can just ignore them. IMO you are setting them up for trouble later on.

Yep, you have a social media problem here, not a boyfriend problem. She's far too young to be on instagram.

I'm trying to work out the logic now, for why it would be OK for 13 yo to be exposed to Instagrams content. Film certification would say 15 or 18, I wonder what logic they're employing, for 13 year olds to be deemed old enough to make sense of, and not be traumatised by, any photo some crazy wants to post?

I was working for Vodafone when SMS (Short Message Service - the original term for texting)was introduced. It was considered a gimmicky add-on to the serious business of voice calls. A typical package gave people 50 or 100 messages a month. No one anticipated how it would take off.
I couldn't tell you exactly when they were launched but my DD was about 2 when I joined the company and she is only 22 now so it certainly wasn't 30 years ago!

Like other posters I think 9 is much too young for an instagram account.

Too young for social media and to be messaging

I personally wouldn’t encourage having a boyfriend and just let them get in with their friendship as that is what it is

Mine are older and we don't allow social media, they can text once at high school and Skype but no Facebook, IG etc.

There's no way I'd be giving a mobile to a primary school child and certainly not access to IG etc.

Children are too often sadly gaining validation from social media how does that impact their emotional growth what happens when no one is interested in what they post

Ds is 10 and won’t be having any social media account for a while yet it can be so damaging and yes I’m mean becuase I won’t let him but then I thought adults were mean when I was young (for what I can’t remember now)

The bf is not a problem but a 9yo with a smartphone is crazy.

Totally agree about Instagram.

OP, have a look at this and encourage others to sign up, it's just going live in the UK:

sign4year9.com

You need oversight of it.

In year 5, some years ago, at our primary, there were several incidents of boys egging each other on to ask for pictures of their girlfriends in crop tops, and girls posting them after lots of angst 🙁. And dds friend (with ASD) has nearly 2000 followers on Instagram because her account was not private at first. (She shared pictures of herself with my dd all that time - while my dd was not yet allowed Instagram). These are just two examples, I could add worse. Of course it is not all bad, a great fun tool for sharing and identity forming, I love it in general, you just have to stay true to yourself and your interests.

I'd be more concerned about your 9 year old being on Instagram. That's the real danger.

I know many 9 year olds on Instagram, Snapchat etc - not mine though. Despite her moans about 'all' her friends having phones, she doesn't need one yet. I have a teenager too and I see how it can end up taking over their lives.
At 9 a boyfriend will really be just a boy who's a friend. If you're worried then limit her time talking to him, get her to chat more to other friends too, or invite him round so they can talk in person. Alternatively, delete her instagram account until she reaches secondary school at least.

Er, I'm 40 ish and I wasn't texting when I was 10.

First phones were at 25 ish and texting cost money, had a limit and took forever to send tapping out on a numeric keypad.

So not remotely like a 9 yr-old with a smart phone and Instagram. Too young to understand it.

Mine didn't have social media e.g. Facebook until 13. We made it into an event on their birthday to get an account.

Not 30 yrs... a friend was telling us about his tech hijinks to use his phone to send text msgs in about 1998 & we were baffled why would a person do that when email was so easily available.

I dunno. People used to write notes on paper & send several letters a day to each other. Sneak around each other's houses & throw stones at the window after dark to have whispered conspiracies. Is Instagram so different?

It's friendship. Nothing wrong in that.

Yes it is different because we weren’t taking photos of ourselves and then putting them in the notes. Nor were people taking those photos, copying them and showing them to everyone in your school.

And complete strangers weren’t sneaking round to our houses giving us notes. They were from people we knew already.

She’s 9.

She shouldn’t be on Instagram or texting boyfriends. She wouldn’t even have a phone if she were my child. There’s no need for it at all.

Not a chance in hell I'd let my DC be on Instagram at 9. At my DC's school the head has already issued a stern warning to parents about signing kids up to SM because they've had to deal with incidents of sexting. These are PRIMARY age kids, FFS!

I do think your child's "relationship" with the boy is innocent, but I'd be worried how long it will stay that way online. If you are going to let her have an Insta account, impose a rule that you get to check what she's sending/posting. If she doesn't like it, close the account.

Didn't realise OP said that her DD was getting messages from strangers.

We used to put pics of selves in some letters. We had Polaroid cameras so instant pics if we wanted. We could show the letters we got to our friends if we wanted. AND the letters said exactly where we lived.

My children's primary sent a letter home talking about the increase in issues between pupils caused by online activity. It said this is a ultimately a parenting matter and reminded of the age limits for social media and certain popular games.
It also said that if problems of this nature are persisting and the children are still allowed to access social media/games then it can be seen to be a safeguarding issue and the relavent authorities can be contacted.

I remember my friend a primary school having a boyfriend in junior 3/4 shows how long ago that was he bought her silver bracelet apparently her mum told my mum years later, it was all very innocent however , my ds1 aged 11 in year 6 has a phone no social media though and I'm holding off untill hes at least 13 and texting wasn't around 30 years ago that would have been 1988 when I was at high school and it certainly wasent around then , even 25 years ago when I was doing my nurse training it was quite uncommon for people to have mobile phones I remember my housemates dad phoning the house in his mobile and we thought it was the height of technology .

My dd is a very mature 13, and I've only just let her have Instagram, and have made her turn of the location function.
Bf in year 5 is fine.

She probably shouldn't be on social media at 9.

Tbh surely at this age, he's just a friend who's a boy rather than a boyfriend?