Phones and Tweens

[Wolverhamptonwanderer]

I currently have an 11 and 10 year old who don’t have phones, so caveat this all with the fact that we haven’t yet hit this stage yet .

However, I was speaking to my sister who is relatively strict (sensible) with her 13 yo DS phone use. So no social media, no phone in bedroom etc. This just seems like the totally logical and sensible approach to me. She was telling me that she keeps his phone in their room overnight and it’s pinging and ringing at all hours.

With most things I can comprehend that people make different life choices / parenting decisions. But this is one thing I honestly can’t get my head around and I’m genuinely curious why people let their kids have free reign on smartphones when they’re clearly so bad for them.

My teens had phones and I wasn't as strict as I should of been through my own ignorance. We had the don't give out personal information chat we had the don't meet strangers offline chat and the don't send nudes chat. But what I massively failed on was allowing the use of tiktok. My dd ended up on mh side of the tiktok algorithm and spent so long watching all these other teens in mh hospitals, running away and hiding from police, self harming. She self diagnosed herself with multiple mh illnesses and it was like a competition of who is the most unwell. It completely changed her as a person. I took her phone which she hated me for but after a few weeks we finally got the old her back. Im now much stricter with my younger kids and tiktok is banned.

So sorry to hear that @youalright but thats great that she’s now better. It’s such a scary place out there on social media. I really let limit my own social media use, but even for
me the algorithm throws up scary or just plain brain rot stuff.

It just seems almost neglectful, especially now we know the harm SM can do.

My tween's phone is genuinely more boring than my Nokia 3330 was (It had Snake!) because we lock it down so much. It has no apps, it locks most of the day, not allowed it upsairs or until all chores and homework are completed. It's basically just to have on the walk to school and back. As a result it has very little allure.

Is it a smartphone @Monsterslam?

Am interested to know how different the parents manage this. Do you use special apps to control things? Does he have WhatsApp?

Yes it is a smartphone. It does have WhatsApp and they are on several group chats. We monitor it all and have talked about what goes into group chat doesn't stay in group chat. How people can screenshot photos and comments and hold them against you later. All contacts need to be approved by us.

My children are 9 and soon to be 11. They have phones in lieu of tablets. We use the Family Link app and have various settings but the main one we use is “downtime” where the phone is essentially unusable between 8pm-8am. I also set app limits on Roblox and Youtube (YT shorts are just as bad as TikTok) and they have no social media, but they do have WhatsApp.
I don’t allow phones at the table, when we’re out or in the car unless it is a really, really long drive on the motorway.

However, I think there is a bit of a judgy attitude towards phones as opposed to tablets. My children go between mine and their dad’s house, so we got them a phone to be able to contact the other parent with more independence as they got older. I think it’s lazy to say “no smartphones” but yes to tablets, telly, gaming devices etc. Social media appears to be the main problem to me, and it almost lets the SM companies off the hook to not regulate properly.

@queenofwandss i totally get it and think kids who go between two houses absolutely need a phone. We will also be getting a phone for our children so they can contact us when they start walking home from secondary school.

I do think there’s a difference betweeen phones and TV / pads (although less so in the latter) though. I think the ease of use of a phone does make the addictive properties greater. The fact it can always be there in your pocket, the fact that you feel at a loss if it’s not there. I don’t think that feeling is as big with tv / pads. Obviously as much rubbish stuff can be viewed on pads, and parents need to control that, but I think there is a bit of a difference.

We are having this debate. Our 10 year old (year 5) doesn't have a phone but several of her classmates have I phones with whatts app and wide social media access. We are considering giving her a very basic phone for year 6, so she learns how to use it responsibly before she needs one in year 7 - her commute to secondary will be several miles on unreliable public transport so she will need to be able to contact us. DH is very against it until year 7. My view is she should start to use it with her small lovely friend group to get used to it before going to secondary with a large number of unknown children. Any views on this gladly received

Neither of my kids currently have phones. They just don’t need them atm (no judgement to kids who do have them).

My attitude is pretty Victorian about this stuff atm (I’m sure this will change soon though).
I think in year 7 they will get a basic brick phone (I need to do some research about whether you can get any kind of v.basic phone that allows WhatsApp). They won’t have any SM or YouTube on it, Phone will be in our room overnight, and if WhatsApp is an absolute necessity i will approve contacts (like above poster), and no joining of massive groups with people they don’t know.

I just feel like this is a hill im willing to die on (currently). I know there’s an argument for letting your kid learn to self regulate, but I think you can do th at gradually over the next few years. I find it bloody hard to self regulate phone use, so god knows why we expect 11 year olds to be so amazing at it.

I can also just see the utter brain rot that happens with my nephew and his mates. They’ve totally stopped being creative or sociable in play dates, instead just defaulting to sitting on the sofa all looking at their phones. I just find it mad that that’s becoming the norm.

Absolutely agree. My daughter went on a playdate and her friend spent a chunk of her time on her phone whilst DD was there, showing her and talking to her about it, but still on her phone. Which felt a shame, she could have done this after my daughter left, but some seem to he addicted.

Like you, I want a brick phone, with some controlled whatts app access. I think it does exist.

I think the problem with phones / social media / you tube etc is getting caught in a loop of just watching other people do cool stuff but not actually doing any of it yourself.

I think there’s so much to be said for boredom enabling creativity, and devices totally stifle that.

The other alternative I’m thinking about is an cellular watch so they can call wh en out if needed.

Yes this is what we've done. But I also am teaching what to do when all the transport goes to shit, it's pouring with rain and your phone runs out of battery/is stolen. Because I think there is a tendency to be so reliant on phones.

My 9yr old uses an old iPad and an old IPhone (for if the iPad is out of battery, has no sim card yet) with her own iCloud sign in, she is on some friends group chats, rule is i can check them, i set up family so she goes in to downtime 45 minutes before bed, when that kicks in all apps are locked and the only people she can message are me and her dad (for if one of us is out/away)
She uses YouTube kids and that’s limited to 2hrs a day, I sometimes extend it depending what we’re doing, she loves watching gymnastics videos as it helps her with her technique and try new moves.
It is not allowed to be in her room at night or during meals.
She’ll get a SIM maybe part way through Y6 with very strict instructions not to give out her phone number to anyone other than close friends.
Thankfully by allowing the group chat the novelty seems to have worn off as she rarely checks it.

Just be wary of YouTube kids. I thought it was pretty safe. Until I found some porn type material on there when my daughter came to me asking 'mummy what are they doing'. Another parent at our school had a suicide vlog come up when her child was watching.

Now they aren't allowed on it on their tablets, only Netflix kids and bbc player.
Plus Internet browsing if an adult is doing it with them.

Very true. I used to commute across town to school, I didn't have a phone until I was 18 (mid 40"s now). My parents went through the journey home via public buses, in case the school bus didn't turn up. And I always had money for a payphone.

They obviously haven't mastered the do not disturb function.

You can stop it receiving by putting it inside a metal tin.

Yes phones will ping all the time if you have a lot of apps on them and they all have notifications.

Look at pinwheel phone - no browser or social media but you can download WhatsApp. Also looks exactly like a smartphone

It's simple things like arranging a time and place to meet people if all else fails, look up your route before you set out, tell people where you are going and what time you expect to be there, have emergency contact numbers written out somewhere (we put a sticker inside all shoes), who to approach if you need a phone (a woman working in a shop is our go to), how to read a bus timetable.

Mixed in with street smarts like always sit near the driver rather than at the back of the bus, avoid areas with men generally, stick to well lit and populated areas etc.

I think many look back at the damage of sites such as Tic Toc.

I'm glad she is much better now

Because they are abit weak and scared to parent.

My 13 year old also has no social media, no Snapchat, no unrestricted access to her phone.

But absolutely what you describe is my experience. Her friend had a phone and TikTok/snapchat at 10 (clearly okay by her family because her mum, siblings, aunties all follow her). My dd gets messages all times of the night. I read her messages and I can see many of them are up at 11pm/midnight.

There has been an incident or two over the years where two friends got into a really nasty back and forth in a group chat. I don’t allow her to be in big group chats, but I do allow ones with actual friends (this was like her class from primary school who all went to secondary together so maybe 10 friends). Dd is never around when this happens because it’s always late at night. She’ll wake up the next morning to 100s of messages because of whatever argument kicked off and they all seem to be up and on their phones.

These are kids who, from all appearances, come from good homes, nice families. These aren’t kids who are getting in trouble at school or from volatile home lives. These are kids parents who should be able to parent effectively and thoughtfully and I think it’s shocking that they don’t. Dd only just turned 13 and is the only one of her friends who doesn’t seem to be on Snapchat and social media.

@BushmillsbabeThanks so much for mentioning that, I’ll make sure to check what she’s watching and get her to watch it when we’re around, not unsupervised. Such a shame something aimed at kids gets things like that.

I don’t think they were telling me because they were worried about being woken up, but more pointing out that his friends are messaging at any hour of night so clearly have no controls on their phones.