To wish I'd never bought my children Ipads?

[Goodnurseorgremlin]

I have six year old twins. They have never had ipads/tablets until this Christmas where I relented and bought them an ipad each.

Worst thing I ever did. I'm quite strict. with them They are only allowed an hour on a morning on weekends and same after school weekdays. It's still driving me insane. Pre ipad they would have been watching TV or playing at this time on a morning. Now they are glued to their ipads watching absolute brain dead kiddie trash on YouTube. I've had to send them to the kitchen for my sanity.

Can anyone relate? Is it too late to tell them santa needs the bloody things back?

What did you think was going to happen when you let them have them? Over the course of the next month limit the time they have on them and then take them away.

Just don't allow YouTube. My son has an iPad but he has no browser on there. He does Cbeebies games, an educational reading game and reads books/audio books on Borrowbox, and school homework games. So it can be a useful tool. The Cbeebies games and Teach your monster to read are great, educational but still fun.

You Tube is absolutely awful and you cannot control the content however hard you try.

It is banned in our house and my kids are older.

if you want them to do educational stuff there are apps they can use.

IMO 6 is far too young for an iPad, let alone an hour a day.

pack them away, or even better sell them on.

As others said get rid of YouTube and put educational games on them.

The world they will be living in as adults will have a huge population of screen addicts so it’s unlikely they’re going to be any more disadvantaged than others.

Their future leaders will be the ones who grew up reading books and learning about the world around them as their friends became screen zombies high on UPFs.

I admit I gave my eldest a tablet too young, but it was lockdown and all senses went out the window.
It was an Amazon kids one though so I have a lot of control over it, I can allow specific websites and YouTube is almost impossible to add to it.

But I made it clear on rules, I set times on the screens (I think you can also do this on Apple?) and I set the rule of no YouTube. Obviously it's harder to impose on an open device but I think you can block it? And explain if they go on it, you can see the history and will remove as punishment?

Put some trust into them but with rules your happy with.

Or if you do want to remove them as much as possible, say they are just for a weekend for an hour in the morning/evening.

The number of people here casually saying you should tell them the tablets are broken or just disappear them, and that they would never dream of buying a 6 year old and iPad, is really telling. I have a 5 year old and I know from playdates that she really is the only one of her friends, bar one, who doesn't have an iPad. My 5 year old begs for a tablet every day. She sees all her friends have them. I don't intend to buy one but it's totally normalised for this age group and not having one makes her an outlier. Op hasn't done anything most parents are not doing.

That's not to say op shouldn't take the tablets away but I think posters need to understand that that will be the start of a daily battle, not a simple fix where the kids will just forget they exist in a month or two.

My MIL was very upset that we asked her not to buy our TWO year old and iPad for Christmas. This thread confirms we probably did the right thing (we're not perfect - screens are already a bit of a battle!).

Someone bought my 3 yr old a fire tablet for Christmas. They asked me before they bought it and I thought it could be handy for long journeys in the car etc. They very quickly became obsessed with it. First thing they asked for in the morning etc.
I tried to lock it down as best I could. You tube is a scary place with lots of fake paw patrol cartoons etc. It was the endless clicking on to the next thing without really watching anything that concerned me the most.
In the end I told him I smashed the screen on it by accident and it is in getting fixed. He still asks for it every now and then. I appreciate that your kids are older so this might not work. It frightened me how quickly they become obsessed with it despite time limits etc. Try get rid if you can. You have my sympathy!

I bought one of these for my daughter and we agree how much time she'll get (usually 10 or 15 mins not an hour!) - and it worked miracles:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/LIORQUE-Countdown-Classroom-Teaching-Pomodoro/dp/B0C3GT78CD/ref=sr_1_3_sspa

Worked incredibly well from day 1 - she abides by it 90% of the time without prompting. It seems she basically thinks it's another toy rather than an evil plot to get her off her ipad :-)

My kids aren’t allowed to watch YouTube without supervision whether on the iPad or TV- so I’d start by deleting the YouTube apps from their personal iPads. That way they can watch YouTube shows of your own choosing only as a treat, you don’t have to constantly hover over them to check they’re not watching brain rot or something inappropriate, and you have another bargaining tool/ treat at your disposal.

Secondly, you get to choose what goes on their iPads. So if you only want them playing educational games, then only put educational gaming apps on there.

Ipads aren’t bad, they’re just tools, and you get to program them anyway you like to suit family life.

My kids are quite artistic so their shared iPad only has the school homework apps, their kids Spotify account, sketchbook, iMovie and canva - they spend ages playing around on those and I don’t get the annoying sounds in the background.

Take the app off or hide it

OP you've done a ...less than optimal thing. Had the result of your decision and got arsey when we point out the ...less than optimal action you took is having this negative effect.

Letting 6yos have a tablet and unfettered access to YT is barmy. Be the adult.

My DC’s school sets homework on an app? Mine both have a fire. It’s easy to manage what they’re watching and screen time. They’re allowed an hour weekdays and two weekends.

I let my 4 year old have the iPad twice a week for an hour on the weekends after her bath while I dry her hair and then she chills on my bed on it and gives me time to clean up after dinner etc

you tube is blocked, she has a few games she plays - a frozen game, a Sesame Street game and a little one with some sick animals you make better with various things (bandages, medicine, etc) or she can watch bluey or something on Disney.

Nothing else is accessible!

first id lock the thing down with strict controls and then id start reducing how often they can use it!

I know what you’re saying, plenty of much younger children have devices, we held off until about age 7 and thought we’d done quite well too. My DD never had access to YouTube but she was playing really naff games and we weren’t keen so the tablet just got ‘lost’ for a couple of years. She asked about it regularly for a week or two then forgot about it and went back to playing, drawing etc. So that’s my advice, just make them disappear, it’s absolutely worth it.

She’s almost 11 now and she still has the same tablet, which was eventually miraculously found… still no YouTube, she uses it for Minecraft and a couple of other games. Of course we also have the pressure of her wanting a mobile phone as her best friend got one age 8! So that’s fun. But holding off for now. It’s not easy but stay strong. She is an only child so that can make things more challenging but hopefully your twins play together at least some of the time!

Good luck!

You're the adult, take them back.

This is interesting. As is the poster above who said most of her friends’ kids have i pads as for us, out of my closest friends and family and their kids, only in two families the kids have i pads. So for us it’s normal not to have one yet.

Doesn’t mean they should…

I don’t see any issue with screens however YouTube is absolutely brain cell destroying crap!

I would rather them watch two hours of a film than half an hour of YouTube.

Delete the app, download some age appropriate educational games and apps and then sit and pick films or episodes with them to download so you know exactly what they’re watching and then turn the wifi off so they can’t download or watch anything different.

I’ve literally just got my kids iPads - as in yesterday. They’ve had limited access to their brothers for a while and I let my six year old watch it whilst I get his younger brother down and until his bedtime so I can watch something other than Dennis the menace in the evenings. So mostly selfish.

Mine have not begged for a tablet. I find that odd in itself.

I would not let them have any iPad time before school at all. An hour after school sounds reasonable.

I think you are getting an unnecessarily hard time on here op.

My 7 and 10 year olds were bought old iPads by their dad/grandparents last year. In all honesty I wish I had never agreed to it. They have caused more problems than they solve. Since then I have become aware and done more and more research about the problems screens can cause, and I’m not just talking about the recent tv show. I banned YouTube a few months ago. I’ve always used the parental controls to restrict their screen time and I’m cutting it down more and more. However, I’ve found the parental controls glitchy and unreliable (and I’m tech savvy!) so watch out for this.

You can’t do anything about what’s already happened. Decide what you want to happen next. If you don’t want them to have YouTube then tell them the app is going and delete it. My two complained for a couple of days and then forgot about it. It’s ok to admit you’ve made a mistake, just think about how you want to move forward. I’m a single parent which is tricky at times. I’m sure having twins is hard work too. Now we know better we can do better. We aren’t the first generation of parents to struggle with this kind of thing. My parents bought me a tamagotchi when I was 10, they had to take it away because I was addicted.

I agree with you about much of youtube, am appalled by some of the stuff there. However there are some good things, even educational, music, etc. I've found helpful videos when I am stuck trying to do something. As adults we can be discerning and just go for what we really like or need, ignoring the rest. I wouldn't allow small children to have access to it but it really is not all bad.

Your 4 year old is already using an iPad everyday for ages.

this to me is far too much, but that’s my opinion.

why Does she need an iPad to entertain her while you dry her hair or tidy away dinner?

what’s wrong with playing with actual toys, colouring, reading etc? You might already do that, but a 4 year old shouldn’t need an iPad every day

it’s good for little brains to be bored… it allows their brains essential thinking time

So many judgmental people on here.

Op I can totally see why you've bought ipads. They are handy things to have, esp if schools are using Sumdog, Hit the Button or other apps.

You just need to sort the parental controls.
There is a Kids Tube as well as YouTube. Set it up limit it and remove YouTube.

Yes at 6 Ceebbiees will be getting babyish. Move them onto CBBC.

I guess if you set there KidsTubes and like certain things the algorithms will show similar.