Do you send your kids' iPads on playdates?!

[Purpleturtle45]

This is doing my head in recently. Whenever my daughter (9) has a friend to play they bring their iPad (or equivalent). I have playdates to get them off a screen and wouldn't dream or sending her on a playdate with her tablet. I have 2 older kids and this was never a thing!

Tech is so user friendly these days that those that don’t have it from young won’t be at any disadvantage. It’s not like when we had to learn to problem solve IT issues/burn CDs/download songs etc.

No I don’t, and I’d be very annoyed if a child brought there’s here!

No, because I would never allow a child young enough for playdates near one.

It's not shit parenting, it's letting the kids have some downtime with Friends. My kids have friends over all the time, especially right now on summer break. I'd say we have kids here playing at least 4 times a week. So they have lots of time to play different things and sometimes it ts tablets. Maybe playdates are less frequent in your house so more of an occasion. Here it's just a chance to hangout with friends not a formal invite for a day of structured educational activities.

Not the 14yo but the 11yo does.
They are both into minecrafy/roblox

Absolutely not.

Tacky moron parents, that is totally unacceptable.

God help them if careers don't drastically change as these children will be unemployable.

Yes. 3

That's just daft. You think because a kid plays Minecraft at a friend's house for a couple of hours it's going to make them unemployable?. Thats just bonkers 🤣

Mine dont and they are totally fine about it. 🙂

I would ask them to leave with me but tell them if they want to message their parents on it at any time they can

My kids sometimes had playdates at that age that were Minecraft playdates. They could play online together, but preferred to do it when they were physically close too. Basically a LAN party. So those that could bring a device did and we provided what we could for those that couldn't. Minecraft was a bit of a saviour during COVID so I was glad they had that solid foundation playing together.

Mainly though, no, they didn't bring devices.

My kids are older now but I would never have done this, nor have I experienced it. Playdates are for playing.

No because we don’t have one. Kids are 10 and 12. No phones here either yet. DS12 will get one for Christmas.

One friend came with one and then told me he was taking it downstairs to play Fortnite. No, you are not. I gave him the option of going home ie I could call his mum but no iPads here. He was happy to stay.

My daughter has just started doing this sometimes at 13. She is into gaming and sometimes she and her friends get together specifically for this purpose, which I am OK with. My younger child never takes an iPad anywhere.

I’m left with a vision of a load of iPads all coming out to play together.

Absolutely not

the iPad is for long car journeys and planes only. That’s literally it

No because ds doesn't have one

Agreed! I have 2 kids.

They don’t have tablets so no they wouldn’t bring them on play dates.

It’s weird how repetitive you are with thinking every young child should have their own iPad.

My 9 year old and his friend have arranged to have their tablets at a play date before, not an issue they just wanted to see what each other were playing and swapping tips (such as on Minecraft) as they talk about it at school. No major issue, it was one of the activities they played together including football, at the park and Lego. Life’s all about balance and teaching safe use of devices.

Yep I do with 8 yo DS. He goes for a fair few hours usually and they will play outside a lot with each other but then have some Roblox time which they enjoy. Never really thought it was a big deal. If he was only going for a short amount of time I wouldn’t, or if they had something solid planned for the full duration.

My DS (7) doesn’t have an iPad, but even if he did I wouldn’t allow him to take it on play dates! And if he did have a friend who brought one over I’d probably gently suggest putting it to one side while they played with Lego etc.

If the parent asks can they bring one- eg Tom was wondering if Toby could bring over his tablet to play, otherwise no. And when kids bring them as they walk in I say do you want to go put that on the table so ye can play later? Lesson learned after for a rainy day I put out where’s wally books, colouring stuff, uno, boppit and more on the bed and they never went into the bedroom just stayed on screens. Afterwards son saw it all and said ah that would have been fun and I wanted to throttle him!!!!!!!