to ask if YOUR 7 year old has a mobile phone?

[Wellhellooothere]

So a report out today reckons that HALF of 7 years olds have a mobile phone - nearly 50% of 5-10 year olds with phones, most by 7 years old.

IS that true?? I can't think of a single 7 year old with a mobile, and I work in a school... the age seems to be Year 6 going onto Year 7 where we are.

So tell me, am I wrong, does your 7 year old have their own proper mobile phone? I don't mean access to a tablet or one of those vtech toy things, I mean a real phone as this report says??

YABU - yes they have a phone
YANBU - no way, too young

www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/mobile-phones-children-kids-a9308266.html

The inability to understand that a child might want to be able to tell their father good night or ring them whenever and just tell them about their day or just talk nonsense, like they would if they still lived together is not good enough either.

Ds2 is 6 and has dh's old Motorola phone as a mini tablet to watch videos/CBeebies etc and play games.

It doesn't have a SIM, just wifi.

He would say that he has a phone if you asked him, but it doesn't work as a phone.

Start of secondary. 7 is madness

About half of my sons class have one. He's 9 and in year 5. I've told him he can have one for his next birthday.

Really JaquesHammer ? That was in reply to the poster on 31/1 stating that her child 'needed it' to contact her when she was with her father 'without going through him' !

Please explain where the lack of comprehension lay ?

Ds2 is 6 and has dh's old Motorola phone as a mini tablet to watch videos/CBeebies etc and play games.

It doesn't have a SIM, just wifi.

He would say that he has a phone if you asked him, but it doesn't work as a phone.

This is the same for my (very recently turned) 8 year old. If you saw her you would think she had a phone, but it doesn't work at all as one.

However her autistic brother firmly objects to her calling it a phone.

Mine got them last summer when they left primary school. Year 7 most kids have them but not all.

My 10 yr old doesn’t, but she has borrowed her dad’s phone once or twice when she was in a show or at a sleepover (it’s a brick, so she can’t do much damage!). She’ll have one to start yr 7, as many others have stated.

Not RTFT.
No way, far too young. Mine got a phone when they started secondary school, and that's only as they were making their own way there and back and I liked them being contactable in case there was a problem/had to stay late or whatever.
Why the hell do you need one at 7? They went everywhere with me at that age.

My DS(12) got his first mobile when he passed his transfer test. So 11+.

This morning I was on Instagram and one of my suggested friends was one of my DD's classmates

Not IG, but FB - with the now 16 year old when he was 8 and I was on FB (not him) a lot of suggested friends were ones in his class.
Just why? There was about half his class on there from the age of 8.
Just no.

Btw if your child's phone has WiFi they can do absolutely everything except make network calls even without a SIM card. They can even make calls via WhatsApp, so if it's on a WiFi network it is capable of being used as a phone for pretty much all intents and purposes.

If your young child has a phone without a SIM card it is worth checking the phone regularly if they have WiFi access, and installing the strictest parental controls which involve you being sent alerts and permission requests if they're primary age.

Definitely not. I don't know any 7 year old who do, but about half of my son's Yr5 class does.

My ds got a fairly basic phone around his 7th birthday so he could call me if he wanted to whilst at his dad's as exh would not allow him to ring me on his phone. Ds also had my old iPhone to use on Wifi without a sim for playing games on & listening to music.

I don't know any 7 y/os that do, and we are chavvy chav chavs what is ruining our children with designer clothes and Iceland chicken nuggets. 😉

Mine has my old phone that's WiFi only. He also has his own iPad & Nintendo Switch and is asking for a Fitbit or Apple Watch for his Bday. Those are the types of things 7 year olds are into these days.

My 7 and 9 year olds both have mobiles.

They are mine and OHs old phones and we bought SIM cards for them. They mainly use them for paying games and sometimes to WhatsApp family members and the odd friend.