6 year old - dad said she can have a mobile phone!!

[Winginitt]

DD who is turning 7 in a couple of months has been asking for a mobile phone for months now, I have been adamant that the answer is no. A few of her friends and both of my nephews have phones so she believes she needs one too. I have explained countless times that she doesn’t need one, she has so many electronics (Ipad, tablet, Nintendo, even one of those kids cameras!) she can use my phone to call her family/friends and I just feel she is too young! Her dad has called me this evening to say that he has taken her to a phone shop over the weekend and wants to talk with me about getting her a phone! I said straight away the answer is no, his reply “you don’t let her have anything” (rude, also not true🙄) and that it is not just my decision to make. I don’t feel comfortable with her having a phone and can’t see the reason for her needing one. He is purely only considering this because he wants to give her what she wants. Am I in the wrong here?!

Still too young for a mobile stick to you guns.

Phones are more robust & practical in size than tablets. Often much cheaper too. If you get one without a sim it will only work via Wi-Fi and essentially only function as a tablet. For games etc.
lots of people have passed comment on the fact that mine have a phone yet theirs have a tablet that is used in the exact same way.
Perhaps you could agree to no sim?

It's ridiculous. If he wants to buy and pay for it, thats his funeral. It can live in a drawer when you're around.

Tell him he can get her one and it can stay at his house (presuming you don't live together based on your OP?) but at your house she's too young for a phone so won't be getting one yet.

Primary school children shouldn't have a mobile I'm my opinion it is way to young

Too young! Keep her away from phones for as long as you can.

It depends on the child. We have a three tier school system here and it's normal for kids to get their first phone at the start of year 5 (age 9-10) when they start middle school because the vast majority of them walk to and from school themselves at that age.

Regardless though, OP doesn't want her DD to have a phone but it sounds like dad is going to get one anyway. I'd let him carry on because his comments (you never let her have anything...) sound like he'll use it as an opportunity to undermine OP. Let him get the phone and it can be a toy for his house, where it can stay.

Let him set it up and pay for it, I sure it and advise her on how to use it sensibly and take full responsibility full responsibility if she loses it or accidentally calls someone in Australia and forgets to disconnect and he has to pay for it!

It sounds like she has way too many screens as it is. If the phone doesn't have a sim it'll be no different than a tablet as pointed out above, and as such perhaps not a fight worth fighting. But you'd need to be certain that she won't access a sim card obviously.

But I kinda feel like you made a rod for your own back. Who needs and ipad AND a tablet ?

I think that's really too young. I had old phones of my mums with no sim about 6-8
DP and I have talked about how much easier it would be to arrange things with dsd direct but it's not yet appropriate for her to have a mobile. She's 7yo

What does she want it for? Just to speak to her friends?

Why the hell does a 6/7 year old need a phone !?

sounds like a lot of gadgets already for such a young age

Normally I'd say she's too young but if she already has and iPad and a tablet I can't see why a phone is where you're drawing the line. A basic phone where she can call and text her friends is much safer than an iPad really.

My 7 year old DD wanted a phone as her friends at school all had one, usually their parents old ones.. they do Group FaceTime's on weekends and message each other. My husband and I didn't want her to have one, so we gave her the option between and iPad or an iPod, she chose an iPod. It looks like a phone but is connected through Wi-Fi only. She loves it and can speak to her friends during school holidays etc, it's the same as a tablet but phone sized.

When I split from my exh he got dd a phone, she had zero interest and couldn't figure out how to is it. I didn't help once. She soon got bored and it went in a drawer. My point is, your house your rules. Just cause he lets her have a phone at his doesn't mean you have too.

Why an earth does she have so many screens at 6? No wonder she wants a phone when she has so many others, presumably she doesn't understand why this one amongst a load of others is banned..

But she is far too young in my opinion. My children wont be getting phones until secondary. I plan to delay for as long as possible. Who wants their kid on social media these days, or a victime of cyber bullying or sexual harrassment, the list goes on.

Are you together? If no then she could have one at his? If yes you need to decide together and if one says no the other should respect it.

Wow. Few judging the amount of screens she has - I expected it. She has an iPad that lives with dad, she has an Amazon kids tablet that I have full control of with me and a Nintendo switch that she can play games on/connect to tv. She’s not a big screen girl (switch literally hasn’t been charged for about a week) she’s very active and loves to be outside, she is not a child that sits on her screens all day and they never leave the house HOWEVER she wants a phone to call people and dad has said his reasoning for getting one is so he can call her - he knows he can call me whenever he wants to speak to her, we do get on very well but sometimes things like this happen. DD does not go out to play in the street/park with friends as we are rural so any play dates are organised and I or someone’s mom is there with them so no need to ever get hold of her and she doesn’t walk to school alone as it’s a 10 min drive away.

I do believe a mobile phone is a lot different to a tablet that emails me every time she wants to download something and allows me to turn it off when I feel she’s done playing.

No, she’s way to young. When they go to secondary school is a good age. She’s got a tablet and you can make calls / message friends via that.

Assuming you are talking about an android phone it really is no different from a tablet other than it can make normal phone calls. You can still set it up with parental controls and you can obviously turn it off/restrict access to it.

For me the phone itself isn't really the issue, the issue for me is the expectation of access to the phone. If your DD/DH is expecting your DD to have her phone with her most of the time including for example in her bedroom in the evening then that to me is a problem.

100% no. Disappointed to read that her dad seems to think giving a child what they want is a good enough reason.

If he gets her a phone, just forget to charge it.
and don’t remind her to take it with her.
with any luck, she will lose it.
or you could “tidy” it away when you are cleaning.

Why is it safer? You think it’s safe for a young child to be able to share content via text and WhatsApp?

What basic phone are you thinking of that has WhatsApp? I'm talking an actual basic phone. Not the iPad she already has with those kinds of apps.