Would you rather give your kid a dumbphone or a smartphone with strict monitoring?

[BeOliveCat]

My daughter just turned 11 and we are at that dreaded milestone: the first phone.

I'm completely torn. I want her to be able to text and call me and maybe use WhatsApp to keep up with some friends. But the moment you give them a smartphone, you open the door to all that endless social media drama, random DMs from creeps, cyberbullying, etc.

Some parents I know go the dumbphone route: literally just calls + texts (or a smartwatch) and nothing else. But then I worry she will feel left out and secretly find their workarounds through a freind's phone or whatever. Most give their kid a regular smartphone and load it with monitoring tools like Helmit.org. That might be a bit invasive though.

It feels like there is no winning here. I just wanna make sure they are safe online, but there are so many compromises you have to agree on.

Kinda stuck here, what worked for you?

How about no phone at all? An 11 yr old doesn’t need one.

We started with a smartwatch and honestly I would not bother. The location mapping was inaccurate and it was impossible to have a conversation if she was in a crowded area (e.g. on a bus).

I really wish we hadn’t got her a smartphone at 11. We were in Europe and she had to use the public bus home from school, and it had a QR code ticket, so we were bounced into it. But now it’s all about WhatsApp, we’ve finally nailed down YouTube but it’s nigh on impossible, and if you’re not actually in the room with her, she’s on it. You have to think about whether she’s on her phone all the time, or she would genuinely be on it all the time.

Sadly even dumb phones have a basic WhatsApp. It’s a child protection nightmare. You’re not supposed to use it until you’re 16 (recently up from 13) and that’s because they have no intention of limiting the stuff that gets circulated.

Delay it all as long as you can.

Smartphone but strict controls partly because music apps is how kids access music.
And being able to see whats in their bank account or pocket money card.

Smartphones get a bad name but really the issue is social media and addictive games.

I wish it was that simple. I clearly remember the freedom & creativity of my childhood… But, I totally different generation to my child. I’m two generations away, at least. DS will have tech.

He’s 5 now & never had a children’s device, tablet or looked at our phones. He watches TV. But, once he starts school, they’ll be using tech. It will be a different world when he’s a tween.

It can be that simple if parents start saying 'no'. Kids using tech at school is one thing, having their own device is another.

I agree, no phone. My 13 yo uses a family brick phone for when he's out and about, but no access to SM/apps etc. FAR too easy to get around parental controls, we've learnt the hard way

Dumb phone for sure. Have you seen the barbie one? It's cute
Family computer in the living room or a laptop she uses downstairs only. Much better for tech literacy/actually learning to type and navigate a computer rather than tapping a screen and larger screen/less addictive imo
If you know other parents well locally, try and persuade them to get a landlines just for the tweens and go full 90s
There was an article about it on the Atlantic, it worked really well and helped delay the pressure of smart phones by a few years.

DD has a smartphone, but locked down using Google family link. No YouTube or browser; we have allowed WhatsApp; not sure if we made the right decision there. She knows that if she took off the parental controls, we'd take the phone.

Given she cycles some distance to school, it has proved useful when she's had a puncture; I would definitely let her have some form of phone. We do check it regularly, and while the chats are full of teen rubbish, they aren't concerning

WhatsApp is now a 16+ app. Many schools are starting to ban smartphones this year. I think it's a trend that will continue. So much damage can be done.

Would you know if she’d deleted stuff off WhatsApp before you saw it?

How do they get a child to prove they are 16?

Hold out as long as you possibly can. She's 11, brains are normally fully formed by 25, so aim for then.

Fair question, but I thought you could see that a message has been deleted, just not what it is. I haven't seen many deletions on her phone. Plus when there have been issues, both at school and an extra-curricular activity, she hasn't been involved (confirmed by staff)

Our son has a smart phone (he’s 10), he can’t text on it instead he has stars, so we can see all and any messages he sends/recieves, it also means he doesn’t need to share his number. He is limited to the numbers he can call, so just us really, his grandma and the emergency services. He doesn’t have safari, he can’t download apps etc without us. He has a few games on it, but no youtube, tiktok, snapchat etc.

I'm planning on starting off with this when the time comes

www.pinwheel.com/en-gb/

I have a feeling it may not be so easy as I heard a discussion on the radio where young people were telling all the ways round strictures, and I though one was ‘delete before parents see it’. But you may be right.

But even if you know it has been deleted you will probably not know what it was.

I'm a retired secondary school teacher. Smartphones were so dangerous, in my experience - Snapchat, in particular was used by both bullies and predators.

We gave our children brick phones. They had to prove they could look after a crappy phone before we would trust them with a half decent device. They always had hand me down phones, no contract, pay as you go only and it only got topped up if they did the agreed chores.

Check out Smartphonefreechildhood

https://www.smartphonefreechildhood.org/

it’s a movement to delay the smartphone for as long as possible.

11 is way too young. Hold firm. You’re the adult.

They often do need one at secondary school (so from age of 11) although obviously dependant on what the school uses. My dcs school has an app for timetable and homework. Their timetable changes regularly (classes moved to different rooms.) If they don’t have a phone in school they won’t know about room changes etc. There is no way to print a timetable from the app unfortunately. They are regularly asked to photograph things on their phone in class for info for homework. They do interactive quizzes in class that they have to have a phone to access. Those without a phone/forgot it that day etc can’t join in.

I know this isn’t great and I would prefer if phones were banned in their school but that’s not the case in every school.

Also it’s normal for secondary kids to not come straight home from school (visit friends), having a phone means that can let me know where they are. For my family, me and dh both work full time not from home so the dcs are home alone after school every afternoon. I like them to have their phones so I know when they’re home and can let them know when we’ll be home, ask them to start dinner etc.

Obviously limits on phone use is really important. Also lots of discussions about online safety, i discuss this with my children regularly. I also check their phones frequently. But I don’t believe phones are all bad if parents are responsible in their use and monitoring of them and are proactive in teaching their children about online safety.

Smartphone - my kids grew up at the same time as the tech, so were introduced to smart features and social media (on phones) as they were being developed, which was helpful compared to just being presented with it as "normal" I guess.

Now they have bus pass on phone, locker key on phone, bank on phone, homework, timetable, diary etc

What is more important - what we found we got right - is DOING stuff.
We had sport together once a week. Cadets twice a week. Board game night once a week, out one whole day at the weekend. The opportunity to use a device was limited. Never at the activity, never at the table, never whilst cooking meals or cleaning up, gardening, whatever chores need doing (by all of us), never with visitors round, never in the bedroom. We also use devices fairly sparingly... model the behaviour you want to see.
If your life is full of other stuff, you don't need or want to spend time sitting about looking at a screen. Same tactics used for TV.

But yes, a smartphone is fine, just try to get them to make life more interesting and real than Instagram.

Smartphone with extra monitoring features and screen time limits. Taking pics of nature etc isn’t possible with a dumb phone

That’s really crap of the school, wow. Shocked at such prolific phone usage in a school!

11yo does not need a phone imo, just hold off 🤷‍♀️

We have had a lot of success with a very heavily locked down smartphone. No internet browser, only a very small selection of apps (maps, Citymapper, Duolingo, a dictionary etc). She can’t add any more. So there is nothing “bad” or particularly addictive. She uses it for practical purposes but isn’t that into it - because it can’t actually do much! (We do allow WhatsApp, and like others I am not 100 per cent confident in that decision but it seems ok and we monitor very regularly. She knows we wouldn’t hesitate to remove if issues start).