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)?

And there it is. iMessage (connected to wifi) is exactly like WhatsApp. They can be added to group chats and facetime calls with anyone. They can be sent pics and other media and links. There's a like feature and you can forward/screenshot messages and more. Some obviously will work even without wifi.

An ipad with iMessage without tight restrictions/no internet(that the kid can't circumvent) is no different to a kid have WhatsApp. In fact, it's worse, because kids that are a lot younger have access to that ipad than an 11/12 yo with WhatsApp.

The ignorance is the scary part. Your kid has a device, any device you need to check it, put restrictions on and put the work in. Regardless of ipad,smartphone or dumb phone.

Assigning some things as evil and some as safe, it's where kids fall through the cracks. Something is not safe just because it's not whatsapp or tik tok or facebook. You need to put the work in and KNOW what they're doing, what the apps are ,what can happen etc.

Every generation has access to things the previous generation didn’t.
The problems are similar - kids being excluded for this that and the other. Or seeing things they shouldn’t. My mother used to be up in arms about this teen magazine I used to read that every month had a “your body and what all the changes mean” feature. 🤣 It was actually really informative.
I grew up in Germany. No school uniform. I went to what’s the equivalent to a grammar school over here for senior school. I was relentlessly mocked because my parents were earning heaps less than the average pupil’s parents there. They couldn’t keep up with all the latest Esprit, Benetton, whatever brand was on trend.
I’m pretty certain had mobile phones been a thing I wouldn’t have been allowed one or been told they couldn’t afford it.
So, I don’t want my boy experiencing this for me avoidable situation (though he gets taken the mickey out of because he loves a Pokèmon t-shirt still, not the big name stuff some of his class mates are into, but he insists a trio of starters on a t-shirt’s better than a plain one with a logo 🙈😂 He’s not bothered by the “wrong” opinions of others). But while I allow the phone, I do check it frequently. He knows this is not to catch him out, but to protect him. He’s actually left a WhatsApp group the other day his mates added him to and someone used the word “crap”. Well, he didn’t stand for the swearing and left. 🙈🤣🤣 I have all the parental controls and filters in place that prevent downloading of apps without my consent. He can’t view adult content etc.

I think that’s where it goes wrong. I see his mates texting at 12am, long after he’s in bed - boys and girls. More than half of them have TikTok accounts and other socials. I don’t see anything wrong with the devices themselves, because you can put everything in place to stop them accessing the stuff that takes up all the time. But in my experience with parents in his class it’s specifically the ones that share shit about kids being at risk and how awful, bemoan the fact that the kids spend too much time on drivel and go on and on about how me must protect them, who put ZERO effort into setting up those devices because it’s too much like hard work or because they want to avoid conflict because “Georgie is allowed Instagram”.

Jinx or snap or whatever it’s called 🤣

In contrast we don't have any gaming consoles and i could throw all kinds of data and studies at you about how and why they are harmful. Would that make me a better parent? A more caring parent? A smarter parent? A more thoughtful parent?

Or should I just assume that you made a (hopefully) well informed decision about what works best for you,your children and your circumstances and that's that?

No, it really isn’t- it’s the WiFi access that changes how secure iMessage is, this I know and also Bluetooth, having it on in public places.

iMessage is the name of a message system on Apple phones, whereas WhatsApp is an app and is owned by Meta, alongside instagram and Facebook, in fact WhatsApp is the message service used on Facebook pages, Facebook messenger is available as a separate app. I’ve also researched the age guidance and it’s 13+ for collecting data! Ffs. Again, this is not a feature on a basic phone message service.

I’ve never said I wasn’t aware of all these different things, or ignorant when it comes to tech. It’s because I am aware that I’m finding hard to decide about a smartphone in year 7, it just seems so wrong for children as young as 11.

And I seem to be in the minority in our current year 6 class, which is why I wanted to know if it’s just a given these days that a child has a phone or smartphone for starting secondary.

You will be surprised at how much they grow up from finishing primary school. I felt like my child was too young to have a phone and be walking himself to school etc but after a couple of terms at secondary school he seemed to have aged about 5 years!

Also note on iMessage you can restore deleted messages and no option for single view / timed out photos.

Same here, and that was 7+ years ago! A device was required for all lessons. Previously you could rent a laptop, but by the time she started they stopped that scheme and wanted them to have a phone or tablet.

Showing off in a WhatsApp group is not on, but seriously, they're all going to need a phone for Y7.

It's not ALL kids by any stretch. Not all kids are watching porn and decapitation videos.
Like I said previously, my son doesn't use his a lot but when he does it's to watch marvel clips, parodies etc. He actually loves Pinterest which NONE of his friends have even heard of. He has zero lnterest in tic tok or fortnight or Facebook etc.

It's a lot more to do with how you engage with your kids than the fact they're accessing a phone.
We watch the news, he knows current affairs etc. We have discussions on drugs, county lines, war, social media, everything any anything and nothing is off limits.
I'd never say 'that won't happen to my kid' re social media and mental health etc but a lot of these issues are down to parents not engaging with their kids on these issues and letting the phone entertain them so they dont have to.

I've worked in schools and specialist behaviour settings. Parenting is a lot more to blame than social media is unfortunately.

We probably roll a little differently though... I'm very open with him. It's just me and him so we have a pretty mature relationship.
He's also had a few alcoholic drinks with family meals at the ripe old age of 12.

Still none of it is as bad as I was doing unsupervised at his age. Sneaking places I shouldn't be, necking mixtures of alcohol snuck from a mates parents cabinet etc.

Phones are a worry, social media is a worry, but I worry more about the growing knife culture amongst young boys. Yes this is perpetuated by social media videos often etc but again, parents need to be more involved and not just saying 'oh I didn't know what he was looking at'.

Educate the parents to educate the kids and you don't need to remove the phones from the kids.

Parents need to return to being 'incharge' and not scared of their own children. I see it way too often in schooling. Parents saying 'but i don't know how to say no or take it off them'

Empowering parents and teachers would be better than banning phones for kids in my opinion

100%.

I agree with everything you’ve just said!!!

Everyone here talking about the dangers of mobile phones has been scrolling MN on their smartphone for hours 🤣

The majority of Mumsnet users are adults. The damaging effects of social media are largely impacting children and teens, whose brains are still developing.

I would recommend reading 'The Anxious Generation' by Jonathan Haidt.

During lockdown a lot of charities provided laptops/ netbooks for school work, so it is possible to let the school know that there is nothing for them to use, and libraries (not that many are open these days). If they also cannot afford internet, they would have to download at school to bring home

My year 6 DGS has one, but it is limited to what he can do and who he can contact, and he has a spend limit. It is for things like contacting parents and grandparents

Of course they are not all watching those things or seeking them out, and most parents will have safe search etc on to prevent them finding stuff like that on their own devices, but my point is that if one child has access to those things, then all the kids have access to them, because they can be shown them or sent them unsolicited. It happened in a class I was teaching. A child sent round a horrific video by airdrop and I was saying “stop, don’t open it” but by the time they’ve been exposed to it, it’s too late and they might not tell you as their parent. Police officers need counselling after watching these things.

If your child doesn’t have a smart phone, they can’t be sent anything like that outside your home. School emails have filters on them and perpetrators are less likely to try to send these images in a way that is traceable to them.

If the phones are locked up at school then they can’t be shown anything like that at school.

Of course they could still say, here look at this, on the bus or out shopping or whatever, but it reduces the danger and opportunity.

Which is why I say that whatever controls you put on, your child is only as protected as the least protected child with a smart phone. If we all decide as a community that the norm is no smart phones til 14 or 16, then we protect all our children.

Ive been looking into the different phones that are available , actually, and there are some now that offer parental tracking, but no social media. Which PP gave as a reason for an iPhone. Or music playing, but no social media. So I think maybe smart phone/dumb phone is an unhelpful distinction as it’s not one or the other. The biggest problems are social media apps, picture and video messaging and internet browser access. I think in the past there weren’t these options. Phone companies will respond with products that meet parental demand.

If smart phone sales are banned for under 16s and they are banned in schools then that empowers parents to say “no”. It sets a community norm.

Ban sales or usage? A 13 yo can't just walk into a shop and buy a smartphone anyway. They need to be 18 if it's a contract one.

If you mean usage , how do you police that? What would the punishment be?

Why do you believe that this would be effective when it clearly doesn't work (to the level you want it to) with cigarettes,alcohol,vapes etc.

Parents need to own their choices. If you want to say no ,say no. You don't get to take everyone else's choice away to make life easier for you.

Ban sales to under 16s - that’s what the UK Gov is currently consulting on. Ban use in schools for all ages - that’s what has been implemented here, with consequences as defined by the individual school.

Of course there will always be people who break laws and rules, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t put rules in place to protect children from harm.

How many kids are buying their own phones anyway? I mean sure they can make it a thing, but I don't see how it would have the impact you think it will.

The vast majority of schools ban phone use on site anyway, unless with explicit permission from the teacher.

Hmm, but a lot of people were saying upthread that the smart phones were needed for school, that teachers weee using apps for homework and asking kids to get their phones out in class. That would not happen here, so there is certainly room to go further in getting them out of the schools.

Some schools here have put in lockers and the phones are only returned at the end of the day, which is the best way imo. If a device is required in class, it will be a laptop or an iPad. So a parent here would never be pushed into buying a smart phone “for school” as some parents were saying they were upthread.

Laptops and iPads can also cause problems for distraction, but they are less dangerous , for many reasons, most obviously in that are connected to the school’s wifi which has social media and inappropriate content banned.

If I'm being honest, I think covid was responsible for a lot of it, both in terms of schools and socialising and it became more ingrained/ "habit". That can change in time , especially as new generations grow up and probably should.

I disagree with absolute ,black and white solutions only though. For example I agree with DD's school that phones should be turned off / away. I agree with consequences if the rules aren't followed. I'm even happy to let teachers know if I have knowledge the rules aren't followed. I wouldn't agree to no smartphones for under 16's at all or not being allowed to even take one to school.

I think this is a perfect solution.

Schools can limit access to the internet via their wifi, if a student doesn't have access to data then it can be controlled.

I think all this smart phone free childhood stuff is actually about empowering parents to say no. They know they should. but find it hard. And this is a way for it to be easier for them to say no.

As a few others have mentioned already, my son’s homework notifications and timetable for the day are all on an app so a smartphone is required to access this. He’s also doing his Duke of Edinburgh and again all the logging for his activities is done through an app, so again a smartphone is required to complete the tasks.

Yes @GlitteryUnicornSparkles but people are saying that if smartphones are banned in schools then schools won't be able to rely on those apps. Parents shouldn't just roll over and accept the status quo like "ah well they need the apps for homework" and nothing to be done. Collective action is needed!