Mobile Phones....

[talie101]

What age for a mobile phone please?

Exh and I have conflicting views and has bought already! I know he doesn't need permission from me but I am really anti them at such a young age (8 and 6) - any ideas how I can tackle this issue and hopefully reach some sort of compromise?

Thanks.

What does the child need the phone for?

dc will get bored v quickly as they will have no-one to call.

Far too young. My dc get them when they go to secondary school.

Much too toung! My eldest will be 8 in July and we are years away from getting her a phone.
Mind you, her best friend has an iphone (her mother got an upgrade to iphone4 and gave her 7yr old the old one) Seriously

We have a spare phone at home (£1 phone with £10 sim) that we use for emergencies (when someone's phone is misplaced or not charged). My 9 year old considers it to be 'her' phone, even though it just sits in a drawer in the kitchen.

It could be useful to take to a sleepover, and if it gets lost, it will not break the bank.

No they don't need them that young.

DD had one for her 11th birthday, in preparation for high school

oops sorry , you asked how to tackle the isue but I'm not sure really, other than telling your ex that the DC are too young for them. I mean, who are they going to text/phone at that age?

I don't think they need them at that age tbh.

My DD will get one when she is 10, for Guides and other after school activities.

No definately not. My ds had one for when he started at secondary. Terrible things, I hate them. They get so addicted to their mobile, it's beyond belief. Would never start it early. Texting and internet is worse, he never uses it to phone people really. Gets free text between certain times and it is just constant text text text. Texts even come through at stupid hours too, we ban it from the bedroom and have had to block internet. When you do want to phone them in an emergency, they don't answer or have forgot they have it on silent! ahhh technology, mind you we would probably get more conversation if we text rather than talk!! Teens for you. It tends to be a perminant fixture to his hand. Dd is going to be another kettle of fish as she has life threatening allergies but still she is older than yours now and not yet has one but doesnt leave our sight really.

Ds1 got one at 11 when he started secondary school. Ds2(8) wants one, but has no chance, he will also get one for secondary school.

I did say that my eldest could have one when he started secondart school ( he is 10 and in yr 5).

However over easter hols I got a cheap pay as you go from tesco so him and his brother (8.5) could go up the park on their own (short walk from house ) I felt better about them having a phone and being together . programmed in my mobile, home number and DH mobile .

when not used like that it is put away, they have no need to phone friends.

When they start being independent and going out by themselves. Mine had cheap ones from yr5 because I worked in the city and the train came in just as school finished. If all was well I got to school just as they were coming out, but if I was a few minutes late I wanted to be able to tell them what was happening. At that age they started going out to the park as well.

Try googling the risks associated with children using mobile phones and show to your ex.

I would say secondary school age as an absolute minimum. Why on earth would a child younger than that need a mobile phone?

DD1 had one at 9. She was doing after school activities most days, and the school were forever changing/cancelling at last minute. So it enabled her and DH to keep in touch over what time she needed collecting.

DD2 asked fones "flip phone" for her 8th birthday. As there was not much else she wanted, we bought her one. It doesn't get out much though.