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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to not allow our DS to have a smart phone (secondary school age)

141 replies

snowdropsrout · 25/03/2018 00:34

DS goes to secondary school in Sep. Doesn't have a smart phone at moment in Yr6 . We were thinking 'big school' was the time we'd give in and let him have one. However, he seems prone to bullying/being picked on in school already. We are worried about what will happen when he delves into the cesspit of social media. Do all year 7s have smart phones? Do any/many parents not let their DC have them? Do kids get picked on/left out for not having one? I'm assuming yes! When I see things like this below it really scares me. Its been bad enough with 'ordinary' bullying sad

www.facebook.com/Ninecomau/videos/1750109161694755/?hc_ref=ARRvFV3xEeF-c4QabAqL29K_tPcBTso8j0r52NJT1TrpkSdcKrEAOe8Eng3-oDgivS8&pnref=story

OP posts:
dangermouseisace · 25/03/2018 09:07

My DS was the one year 7 without a smart phone. He had a Nokia basic thing. I’ve relented now and given him my old iPhone, so that he can listen to music/podcasts on the long walk to school and WhatsApp his friends. You can get parent control software that limits what kids can do/how much time they spend on it (with the threat that if they try to subvert it the phone is confiscated and replaced with the Nokia!). iPhones you can set restrictions on even without extra software. I’ve set my sons up so that there is no internet browser as I would rather internet access was only on our main computer at home.

nancy75 · 25/03/2018 09:11

Might be different with girls, Dd is year 8 every single girl in her class is on WhatsApp. Their entire social life is organised via WhatsApp. All home work is discussed via WhatsApp. Any child without it would be very left out of what’s going in.
The only people she sends actual text messsges to are me & her grandparents.

Oblomov18 · 25/03/2018 09:32

Bought ds1 a phone in year 6, ready for secondary. Haven't had any problems with social media.
Don't know anyone who doesn't have a phone at secondary. Suppose there must be a few, but I don't know if anyone.

NinjagoNinja · 25/03/2018 09:36

See, for me, this is a classic case of: everyone has one ergo everyone has one.

If some parents stopped doing this, other parents could stop doing it too.

11 year olds do not need to group chat and plan meet-ups. They also do not need to admire each other's duckpouts and bling.

In Silicon Valley, tech workers don't give mobile devices to their children until much later than 11. They invented this stuff and they don't want their own children caught up in it. Think about that.

Dahlietta · 25/03/2018 09:40

As a teacher, I would say there will be a handful of pupils in lower years who do not have a smartphone, but the vast majority do (and they do bring them in to school - re pp who suggested they don't). I haven't noticed those who don't have smartphones (or even phones) being picked on, but I suspect they feel a bit left out.

I sympathise with you entirely, OP. I'm terrified of DS being at the age where he wants a phone and could realistically expect to have one, but I think that you can't protect them from this forever - the best you can do is guide them through it.

ohreallyohreallyoh · 25/03/2018 09:40

As a teacher, I would say not all have them but very much a majority do. Some teachers use them in class - lots of apps out there of educational use.

CuboidalSlipshoddy · 25/03/2018 09:41

Aside from the exclusion your child will experience, there is a more practical problem.

They will access social media. They will. Every parent who smugly told us their children didn't because "parental controls" or somesuch "my child is 10, not 15" crap found out much later that they were.

When it then goes wrong, the child has two problems: they're being bullied (or whatever) and they have lied to their parents, so before they can seek help for the former they have to deal with the latter. In the one case we watched, with horrified fascinating, the child had been using social media without any guidance, without any oversight, since 12, it had developed into a very bad situation, and we were torn between telling the parents (our kids had given us a heads-up) and not sewing familial discord (the parents were lentil-knitters).

It's the "I don't need to teach my child about safe sex, they are saving themselves for marriage" delusion, or the "I don't need to tell my child to just phone, whatever is happening, and I will collect them from whatever bad situation they are in, because of course my child won't get into a bad situation because of my superior parenting".

Your child will use social media. You can choose between knowing and guiding on the one hand, and not knowing and letting it blow up in their face on the other. There is no third choice.

altiara · 25/03/2018 09:42

My DD is in Y7 and I think they all have smartphones. Not necessarily the latest one but definitely smartphones. They use WhatsApp all the time for class chat, friend group chat etc. Also she has a homework app telling her (and parents) what homework is set with attachments and when it’s due by.

CuboidalSlipshoddy · 25/03/2018 09:44

In Silicon Valley, tech workers don't give mobile devices to their children until much later than 11.

It's much harder to get a mobile phone with a data plan as a child in the US, and they are phenomenally expensive, hence why over on /r/raisedbynarcissists the holding of the family phone plan over the heads of recalcitrant twenty-somethings is such a big deal. My experience of the Valley is that mobile devices for children are slightly more common than in the US generally, but much less common that in the UK. n=small anecdote, admittedly.

clarrylove · 25/03/2018 09:44

My son's school encourage the responsible use of technology. I think there is one boy in the class who does not have a smart phone. I have been surprised how much he is told to use it in class - y7. Recording music compositions, photographing pages in text books, photographing homework set, recording drama scenes, voting in an app for computer science, using as a fitness tracker for their sport relief challenge, taking photos for an art competition etc. The boy without the phone has to ask to borrow another pupils.

It is also very useful outside of school. He missed a day for a funeral and his mates just what's app'd him screen shots of the missed work.

CuboidalSlipshoddy · 25/03/2018 09:45

My son's school encourage the responsible use of technology

Exactly. As should parents.

LoniceraJaponica · 25/03/2018 09:46

"If some parents stopped doing this, other parents could stop doing it too."

In the real world, unfortunately, this isn't going to happen.

We live rurally, and DD gets a bus to school. The previous bus company that used to ferry the children to school had old and unreliable buses that were often breaking down, and on occasion caught fire. The children having a phone was massively useful under these circumstances.

Strugglingtodomybest · 25/03/2018 09:55

My DS is in year 7 and I think they all have phones, but DS'S group of friends don't use them much from what I can see. DS uses his (my old galaxy 5) to listen to music and play games on mainly. He has an instagram account but hardly uses it.

TheWizardofWas · 25/03/2018 09:57

Urban school, year 8, dd has no phone at all. Is this weird. She hasn't mentioned WhatsApp or anything?

YerAuntFanny · 25/03/2018 09:59

Not weird at all Wizard.

My DS has one for safety reasons, he only uses it to WhatsApp family members pictures and to text/phone me on the school run if needed. He wasn't fussed.

clarrylove · 25/03/2018 10:02

Oh yes, and they use the Google Classroom app where class and homework is set. I think he would be at a serious disadvantage if he didn't have one.

They are also allowed to use them at break at lunch and they play music etc.

TeenTimesTwo · 25/03/2018 10:02

My secondary age DD has a smart phone but with internet access turned off by the network provider. So she can play games on it but not access social media yet.

nancy75 · 25/03/2018 10:29

11 year olds do not need to group chat and plan meet-ups. They also do not need to admire each other's duckpouts and bling.
My Dd doesn’t have any bling & the idea of doing a duck pout has her laughing her head off.
What’s wrong with group chats & meeting up outside school? Friends are generally seen as a good thing!

LoniceraJaponica · 25/03/2018 10:35

How many posters saying that 11 year olds don't need phones actually have 11 year olds at secondary school?

HoneyDragon · 25/03/2018 10:41

He’s more likely to find his own clan and more like minded friends at secondary school; rather than be subject to the big fishes in a little pond. So it’s really a decision as to how you as a parent feel about smartphones.

I think kids CAN utilise social media and communication tools well if they are decent sensible kids. I’ve more than once gone up to suggest DS gets off the damn X box/pc only to go in and realise they are using the group chat feature on the headset whilst they do their homework together which I think is pretty cool.

Echobelly · 25/03/2018 10:45

I think DD will get a smartphone or mobile device at secondary school or maybe for her birthday the term before, as I'm presuming (maybe wrongly?) that it will be difficult for her to establish friendships otherwise. It's not going to be like my school days where you got your friend's landline number and called and asked for them... indeed it's not like kids ever phone one another, as I understand it.

DD is also a gentle soul and prone to be bullied, but I think we'll just have to monitor that side carefully.

madeyemoodysmum · 25/03/2018 10:52

At our school all the homework is done through an app so you have to have access to a smart phone even if you don't have one. I think it's fine. Just restrict what social media he has if your worried.

Kids rarely text each other. It's all wasapp and snap chat and insta.

W00t · 25/03/2018 10:53

Y7s don't need smartphones, they want them. There are about three Y7s at DD's school with dumb phones (she is one) the rest have smart phones. The main thing that she is bothered by is that everyone else just takes a picture of the homework instructions, but she has to copy them all down.

I personally think phones should be banned from schools if they have a camera on- it would probably clear up 75% of the issues with children/phones/bullying.

And I agree- there are prominent silicon valley families now standing up against sm/phone/device usage for children. These devices have been designed to be addictive and are huge time wasters. The less children are exposed, the more time they have to do stuff they want, the better their MH will be too. FOMO destroys MH in teens/young people.

CatMuffin · 25/03/2018 10:57

Even if he had one, surely he wouldn’t be taking it to school with him?! So who would know if he had one??
Grin

CatMuffin · 25/03/2018 10:59

How many posters saying that 11 year olds don't need phones actually have 11 year olds at secondary school?
I think they've got toddlers