Anyone else not given their pre-schooler a phone or tablet?

[Yungry]

He’s never held a phone or tablet or played on one. Not a stealth or brag post, he’s actually mostly non verbal, almost 4. Means I try even harder to engage him in convos etc. my heart breaks when I see tiny toddlers scrolling YouTube on a bus and parents ignoring them.

I feel like the only one not giving my child tech? Everywhere I look there’s children (often in prams) with smartphones in their faces

We limit screen time but my youngest is 2 and does have a tablet she plays games on it mostly we really limit YouTube, sometimes her older cousin lets the kids sit with her and watch it on her phone. I will freely admit that we are a family who loves to eat out and travel so we aren’t above getting the tablets out On a flight train or at a restaurant I feel personally it’s more important they experience these things like different restaurants, travelling etc even if we do let them have a screen for a bit to occupy them. Mine do love Disney films and we have a film night every weekend they love it and will sit and concentrate on the whole film, learn the songs play games about Frozen characters etc I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. It’s only what I did in the 90s I loved Toy Story etc My youngest has very advanced speech receptive and expressive like 36 months plus at 18 months old (confirmed by well comm assessment and Salt assessment as she has a slight hearing loss) and can recognise letters numbers and write her name at 2 and has no issues with concentration so I’m happy with the level of screen time she has it works for us I get why some people do absolutely none but also I think kids need to use some tech as it’s essential for them for their futures .

You hate this country because of an imaginary scenario you've made up? This hasn't actually happened on this thread at all.

We use screen sometimes. Public transport is one of the places we use it most, so you might see me and class me as one of the parents you judge on the bus. You wouldn't see all the time we spend chatting, laughing, playing with and reading to our children. I don't find the bus the best place for that.

Why do they need to read on screens?? What’s wrong with books?

Totally agree with you @MoreDangerousThanAWomanScorned I don’t think OP can really be so judgy when her child has very specific needs and she only has one of them

In fact thinking about it I have a friend who is very very anti screen however her kids aged 2 and 4 have never been on a bus, been in a pub type restaurant once (disaster), never been on a train or plane, never been to the city centre, never stayed in a hotel, never been to church, never been to nursery or day care and never been to sit by the side at older siblings hobbies . Basically their day to day is tailored around entertaining them either in the playroom, garden or maybe a brief trip out to a soft play or playgroup. They get shopping delivered shes only had to take them in a supermarket once or twice in an emergency. So whilst she sneers at youngsters with screens she avoids doing absolutely anything her kids might be bored, restless or disruptive at. If my kids just pottered round the house all day they’d never want screens but we use them sometimes to facilitate other things - I believe them experiencing the world eating out travelling etc is way more important than just banning tech at all costs

We have a 3 year old and a baby. The older one watches some CBeebies most days (more in winter when the weather's bad) and we'll sometimes watch a film at the weekends.

He doesn't use our phones or have a tablet though. Eats fine in restaurants etc without one. Maybe because we never offered it as an option. No plans to change that any time soon.

This is a very unkind comment given that you don’t know why the OP has only one child. It might not be by choice and shouldn’t be commented on.

The school has not bought the set of reading books with the different “grades” or “bands”. They are only available digitally and the children work through them until they are confident readers and get books from the library.

I’m not saying I agree with it.

Give over love its 2025

You must realise that different things work for different children in different situations? Unless you are following parents around all day, I don’t think you can really make an assessment as you can only see a snapshot.

For example, when out we don’t use phones or iPads when out for dinner or on public transport, we play games, do crafts, read books. You might judge me as a happy clappy soft parenting, performance parent. At home we do allow some tv as a break. Maybe other parents do it the other way around and use screen time to minimise disruption to others on public transport and in restaurants, and never at home. You just don’t know unless you’re with them 24/7.

Yes but logistically it’s easier to entertain one kid and very unkind to comment on someone using a screen for their child on a bus when they might have just dropped three more off at school and just want 5 mins of peace

4yo watches curated tv (iplayer and some of our own stuff), always with our agreement it's ok. No phone or tablet. Definitely keeping him off games for several years despite husband being a huge gamer - it just seems too hard to expect him to be able to control his response to it.
No YouTube. But then, I don't watch YouTube either and our tv watching is also pretty restricted. It's not just background.

My toddler has a condition that comes with intellectual disabilities and they are also nonverbal. They don’t have their own device and they wouldn’t be able to use one anyway.

But cbeebies on my laptop or phone is the only thing that sometimes (not always) helps bring them down when they are melting down and violently attacking us. As they do most days lately. We only use screens in the house though, and only in that scenario - or if they’re point blank refusing to eat and we’ve tried everything else it sometimes helps then too.

Before I had my toddler I was also stolidly anti-tech for children. But I genuinely don’t think our lives would be manageable without it at the moment.

I am glad your son can be managed in other ways though! Every child is different.

But both having four children and giving a screen to a toddler on a bus for peace and quiet are choices? Only having one child may not be. I wouldn’t have four because there’s just no way I could effectively parent four, and I’m a teacher who has 30 daily! What I will say is that the children in the classroom who have constant screen access from very young are clear and stand out even at age 4 and 5. Those who use it very sparingly for five minutes peace aren’t, and you are right, we shouldn’t judge, because the Mum on the bus might well be in the latter category, but let’s face it we all judge, it’s human nature.

I’d also say that a lot of parents use a screen saying it’s for educational purposes and a lot of that is the fault of the school - my own school send ebook links home instead of paper books because parents and children were losing and damaging paper books so often it became financially unsustainable, and we send home online numeracy homework because it’s cheaper than printing 30 worksheets per week per class. More money in education would be less screens, at least for my setting.

Mine have never held one and it will remain that way until they are used in school.

Oh I just saw your other posts. I find you are being needlessly judgmental about people whose situation you really don’t know.

As parents of disabled children we should be especially aware of the fact that everyone has their own parenting struggles that may not always be visible, I think.

My children are allowed a max of 30 mins screen time a day with an additional session of family viewing a week. My oldest could read at 4 in part due to the teach your monster to read app and alphablocks.

DC 3.5 has watched things on a phone probably about 5 times in his life and that’s when someone else has given it to him or twice when we were camping and we did it cos he was going to wake the whole campsite at 5am

We take stickers/toys/colouring etc on meals and long train journeys. I wouldn’t be so much of a purist to say to tablet on a really long plane journey though and he does watch TV.

I agree with you OP. They have special phone holders for bloody buggy’s now so kids can watch. It makes me so sad they are missing out on so much of the world.

Some people might not have a choice in how many kids they have, no.

also I actively looked for a senior school which utilised technology more and had better computers tablets etc, the future of the world economy, warfare etc is cyber based and I want my kids to have the best chance to compete with the Korean (as an example) kids who have been coding since reception age

And that’s your choice. My main issue with education, certainly at nursery and primary level, is that there is very little choice for those who don’t want children on screens. Both should be options.

Give over yourself 'not my love' and don't be so patronising. I'm telling the truth, we don't have tablets here