No phone for secondary school

[StillCreatingAName]

AIBU? I feel like I might be missing something obvious on this one, but honestly why do children need to take a smartphone to school? It’s baffling me as to why there appears to be parents on auto pilot buying their children smartphones (£££) now in year 6, ready for year 7 as though it’s part of a uniform policy (and then sharing their purchase on the class WhatsApp, give me strength).

Is this all just a fallout from lockdown times, people were sort of forced into screen life, so now there’s more children at secondary school with them, who may not have ordinarily had a phone until older?
I’m expecting dc to walk home with friends talking and socialising without the inclusion of a screen or mindlessly scrolling social media instead of listening to friends. I can see where a basic phone might be needed to contact home, but that doesn’t mean the phone should be out of school bag anytime during school hours should it, but maybe I’m just being naive, time will tell 🤷‍♀️?

AIBU to say children don’t need to get a £££ phone for starting secondary school? (It goes without saying they don’t need it at all for primary school, IMHO)?

Absolutely right

The kids school policy is phones are not to be used during school hours. Although we have some allowable provision in their pupil profiles because of their additional needs.
I have one in year 7 (daughter) and one in year 10 (son). They both walk home from school and have had a lot of issues with bullying so the Google Family Link works well to see where they are.

This involves the youngest being allowed to use hers to call or text me if she is struggling, a quick call usually means she can be in all her lessons. She also uses hers to listen to audiobooks or music or use one of her art apps during her lunch break because it helps her cope with the afternoon. She also has permission to have lunch with her brother because of bullying. She currently hasn't been given provision for a laptop although she had one at primary school.

Her brother has a laptop for lessons but he uses his phone for speech to type to take notes because he is dyslexic and he can't type well enough to take notes that he can read afterwards. He sometimes needs the phone for coloured filters and magnifier apps for printed materials it works better for him than the products the school can purchase to do the same thing because that way he has access at home and at school. We also have a agreement with some of the teachers to share their PowerPoints and teaching materials after the lesson and I help him type up a summary in a large size font with double spacing. Before he had the laptop we had an agreement that he could use a Kindle to read books and text because he could change the size and font easily. He also had something to make mind maps for more visual learning that doesn't work on his laptop but could be used on his phone.

At the kids school parent contact and payments is through My Child At School it also has a copy of their timetables on it. But they mostly prefer to use Google calendar for that and Google Tasks to add reminders. Homework is set via Google Classroom, all contact between pupils and teachers is via their school Gmail accounts. They use a mix of Google Documents, Google Sheets and Google Slides for homework and Google Drive for storage with occasional use of Abode Reader for pdf files.

They both have Maths homework through the same app called SparkX I think. They both have Science homework through Educake. They are both supposed to do Grammer and Spelling stuff daily through Bedrock. He has English homework through one app and hers is through something different. She has languages homework through two different apps. BBC bitesize is recommended for revision and review and his teacher sends them links to History videos on a YouTube channel because they did a better job of breaking down the topics than the textbook.

Outside of school, they don't care one little bit about social media they use WhatsApp for talking to their friends and they compete with each other on Duolingo. He is obsessed by Spotify and she likes making stuff on Canva. The most used apps other than that are Audible, Smart Audiobook Player and Libby for reading, Pinterest and Mistplay for time wasting, Stocard to access my loyalty cards in shops if I am not with them and their bus apps for travel.

So they have lots of reasons to have phones in secondary school because its easier than anything else.

I think most children inherit their phone when an adult upgrades.

I wouldn't ban them outright and depending on the school I might tolerate some usee.

Eg to photograph the white board with home work on it.

Or the day I covered a photography class in a room with no equipment, and to be fair the students were very sensible. They took black and white portraits of each other.

There are also quizzes and educational

What other parents do is relevant, because of the being left out problem.

The poll on this thread is showing about 50:50 for and against. That’s great - if the 50% against smartphones aged 11 hold off giving smartphones until their kids are 14-16, there’s no problem with being left out.

If the 50% against hold off, schools will also be forced to not rely on them.

For the OP, I’d wait and see what happens. My Y7 DD doesn’t have a smartphone. She doesn’t need one for the bus or for school lunches. They are not allowed to be seen at school and this is strictly enforced. She accesses homework on a desktop at home and texts her friends on a brick phone! I imagine we will get her one in the next few years but we’re hoping to hold off until year 9.

Are kids literally doing homework on a phone? Isn’t that terrible for their eyes? And difficult to type etc?

Yes because that’s where the apps are. The questions are literally on the app and they get marked by the app.
a lot of the apps are multiple choice and the kids learn routes around them

I was almost knocked over by a girl surgically attached to her phone and its screen but she screamed at me Look where you're going you old bat!

Thank you so much @BodenCardiganNot I will read the rest of that later, but
Gen Z teenagers got sucked into spending many hours of each day scrolling through the shiny happy posts of friends, acquaintances and distant influencers. They watched increasing quantities of user-generated videos and streamed entertainment, fed to them by algorithms that were designed to keep them online as long as possible. They spent far less time playing with, talking to, touching, or even making eye contact with their friends and families, thereby reducing their participation in social behaviour that is essential for successful human development.
The members of gen Z are, therefore, the test subjects for a radical new way of growing up, far from the real‐world interactions of small communities in which humans evolved.

😞

The sooner there’s a complete ban on smartphones in senior schools, the better IMO.

There's never going to be a complete ban, though, is there? Because there will always have to be exceptions made for example for those who use their phone as a medical device and as part of care for ongoing chronic conditions. Then you're going to get the odd parent or child (there's always one) who says 'it's not fair' and kicks off with reasons why their child should also be an exception. And so it goes.

The irony is , if your child has access to any internet device they have access to all the things you are worried about. It might be limited, it might take some work to work around but it does happen. A few parents will go through the trouble of having no internet access, or having strict controls on the devices, but the vast majority don't because it's not a smartphone and because it takes work and knowledge . It's just a kids' tablet, oh it's the family laptop. It gives a false sense of security.

I can't tell you how many parents swear blind their kid can't have done x,y,z because they don't "even have a smartphone ". Except they did do it and they got access despite the lack of one.

My son is on a closed loop system for his type 1 management (increasingly common) and as such, his phone is an essential part of his medical kit. Hell will freeze over before his school bans him from having his phone.

Reddit is probably more “dangerous” than WhatsApp. I can go on there and find porn with some random to share and chat to with one word like boobs. WhatsApp is their friends or school mates untill they expand their circles.

It’s a bit like people who think minecraft is safer than Fortnite. If your letting your kids play with randoms Minecraft is more likely to be a pedo ground than Fortnite random matches.

This was in response to and agreeing with the one not much further up ⬆️ lack of smart phone won’t stop bullies or porn or any such stuff.

Of course phones are allowed in these circumstances. Phone are banned at my school but a girl in my form with diabetes has one. This has no bearing on the general phone ban and all the other students understand that.

Overall though phones are terrible for young people's mental health:

https://www.afterbabel.com/p/phone-based-childhood-cause-epidemic?r=2ep2jz&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true

Sparx, Hegarty, Google Classroom, MyMaths, Memrise etc are all websites so don't need to be accessed via phones.

the school use google classroom but everything else is an app. The homework one notifies you when some is set, one teacher likes to set it at about 7 at night for the next day, which means you’d have to constantly be checking the website.

@Topseyt123 I guess maybe then just use books and other resources?
Why do they need personal mobile phones?
If lessons demand it then fine but otherwise it's just distracting.

@MsGoodenough yes but you're using your commonsense and take it from a parent of DCs with T1 diabetes – it isn't as common as you might like to think!

On these threads you get people talking about 'complete bans' and even, on occasion 'no exceptions to that'. Which is rubbish because there will always be some exceptions.

The reality is you won't know the parents to contact. Secondary school friendships don't incorporate parents, and teens are not likely to give a 'rent a number. There is no village.

Of course phones are allowed in these circumstances. Phone are banned at my school but a girl in my form with diabetes has one. This has no bearing on the general phone ban and all the other students understand that

Last time this was discussed on here, one poster considered a type 1 child must be able to go the full day without checking their blood or they shouldn’t be in school; someone else insisted there must be alternatives to phones because what people do before phones; yet another considered there was no medical condition they knew of that needed monitoring with a phone and someone else thought that type 1 children and young people shouldn’t use the latest technology available to them if it meant they had to have a phone in school.

There is huge ignorance and as both a teacher and parent of a type 1, I take sod all for granted.

I think I remember reading that thread, though didn't comment because the level of thickness and prejudice coming from some posters was just gobsmacking!

People really can be utterly stupid. Of course type one diabetics need to be in school, and need to monitor their blood sugar. Before smartphones they had to take the time during the day to do the fingerprick tests. I remember a couple in our year. Then they might either have to eat something or inject insulin, all done in school.

Smartphones and insulin pumps that work via Bluetooth have, I am told, really helped with the management of type 1 diabetes for many sufferers. I know a couple who have found them a real game changer. Why do a (thankfully small) number of people think that diabetic children should not benefit because it could be disruptive to the school day and involves the use of a smartphone? Bonkers! Diabetes management has always had to be incorporated into the school day for those affected. Since forever. Smartphones are now a useful tool in that.

I'm a type 2 diabetic myself so don't have to inject insulin currently. Hopefully I don't get to the point of having to, but if it should happen then I would take the smartphone option in a heartbeat.

My year 7 daughter has a phone as did her sister way before covid. Her school has a BAN on phone im school and do bag checks etc so no kids take their phones to school (which I have often wanted her to at least have it in her bag in case of any issues on the walk to/from school - but that’s just me worrying as she has so far been fine).

She isn’t on any social media and I can check (and do check whenever I want - part of the agreement to her having one). She has my old iPhone (12 I think) and a sim only contract.

you say the don’t need one and whilst I agree somewhat in theory, they do need them it’s their way of life. My daughter and her friends have WhatsApp groups, they arrange meeting up and going out. They talk to each other frequently, it’s been a great way for her to get to know new girls she has met at school too.

its not just using social media to be social. The girls her age make videos on them and whilst I may have performed dances for my parents her friends create videos for me to watch and I love it. I love the pictures they take of each other and I actually think having a phone is not a big deal in 2024. It is very much a way of life.

i would suggest imo learning to embrace it as part and parcel of her way of socialising as a way for you as a parent to be part of that.

and as a secondary notion as she will be spending time at home alone more and then starting to go off and do more things without me, I actually prefer her to have her phone incase she needs me, and so I can see where she is (if I need to).

Just block receiving air drops!

He uses a school ipad, he really shouldn't have to do that himself.

Smartphones are not synonymous with social media... My 11yo is in a trio WhatsApp group with his 2 besties, our family WhatsApp group and spends most of his phone time playing Geometry Dash, Angry Birds or Pokémon... I don't understand the outrage?