Maybe off topic, but is that AI gen gore on the image of the small child looking down at his phone on the left?
Wait Until 8th
41–50 of 351 posts
Re: Wait Until 8th
#42I'm still surprised the "dumb phone for kids" and "dumb watch with basic comms" markets are so underdeveloped (from my perspective). I would love my kids to have (a) gps tracking, (b) ability to send texts/calls to like 5 predefined numbers, (c) tell the time, and nothing else. But watches all seem to have games or weird gamified fitness trackers (Google's new fitbit for kids). Or they are super kid-ish, like bright…
I got my child an AppleWatch SE (a few years ago), which yeah, technically has a bunch of apps but they're not really useful or of interest to them, and if they don't have social media accounts (which mine don't), then it acts as a phone and locater without all the rest.
On the downside they kept begging for a phone so they could text their friends, which was reasonable, and texting on the Watch is a terrible experience. So we finally did give in to a phone but with locked down parental controls, so they can't install apps, etc. (though I'm finding those iOS parental controls don't work as well I had hoped; there's a huge issue with them being reset suddenly -- lots of forums of people complaining about this).
Re: Wait Until 8th
#43I'm still surprised the "dumb phone for kids" and "dumb watch with basic comms" markets are so underdeveloped (from my perspective). I would love my kids to have (a) gps tracking, (b) ability to send texts/calls to like 5 predefined numbers, (c) tell the time, and nothing else. But watches all seem to have games or weird gamified fitness trackers (Google's new fitbit for kids). Or they are super kid-ish, like bright…
I would submit map functionality to the list as well. I think it would be healthy for a kid old enough to tell time to experiment with navigating, maybe following along on their map on drives.
Re: Wait Until 8th
#44Good start ... but it should actually be "Wait until 18". I did this with my son and, now at 25, he has a much more normal perspective on connectivity and social media than most his age. There was ZERO downside (for all you worrisome types who think not having a phone is bad for some reason). Thinking kids "need phones!" for safety / socialization are making that shit up entirely.
Re: Wait Until 8th
#45After high school ended (2:30pm) most days I used to have some kind of club activity (2:30pm-3:30pm) and then hang out in the cafeteria or by the front of the school, waiting for a parent to pick me up on the way home from work (5pm). I had a dumb phone so I could stay in touch, and I could also walk home if I wanted (40min / no sidewalks / 35mph roads), but most of the time I just sat down and did homework and read…
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Re: Wait Until 8th
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO it's not the phone itself that matters, it's what the kids do on it. Phone can be good to communicate with parents, bad for nearly anything else at a young age.
Kids entire social lives run on their phones. Covid accelerated this and pushed down the age for where this was true. Denying your kid a smart phone is basically denying them a social life nowadays. It simply doesn't work unless everyone does it.
Re: Wait Until 8th
#47I'm still surprised the "dumb phone for kids" and "dumb watch with basic comms" markets are so underdeveloped (from my perspective). I would love my kids to have (a) gps tracking, (b) ability to send texts/calls to like 5 predefined numbers, (c) tell the time, and nothing else. But watches all seem to have games or weird gamified fitness trackers (Google's new fitbit for kids). Or they are super kid-ish, like bright…
Re: Wait Until 8th
#48I remember recently reading about a town where all the parents in the entire town agreed not to give their kids smartphones, so then none felt they were missing out. I think that could work really well
> none felt they were missing out
Exactly. It seems obvious to me that the vast majority of social media is junk and I'd prefer to keep my kids from getting drawn into it for as long as possible, and I think a ton of parents feel this way. The main counter-argument I hear is that "that's where socializing happens these days, and if you keep them away from it they'll just be left out / isolated from their peers".
An initiative like this acknowledges that we have some control over our culture. We don't just need to put up with a shitty status quo because "that's the way it is".
Re: Wait Until 8th
#49In my area it's becoming very popular for schools (middle and high) to restrict phones. They put them in the pouch things. I'm a bit surprised how much the parents support it. Talking to a local journalist he said he couldn't find parents with good arguments against it. One of them was "my son runs an online business and needs access to his phone for it". I couldn't get a cell until I had a driver's license, which I…
"Today, a kid might be alienated without a phone." Might ... but more likely not. I can't understand why this irrational fear of potential social problems if not tethered to a phone is outweighing the clear evidence of actual social problems when tethered to a phone has so much traction with adults.
Re: Wait Until 8th
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO it's not the phone itself that matters, it's what the kids do on it. Phone can be good to communicate with parents, bad for nearly anything else at a young age.
Kids entire social lives run on their phones. Covid accelerated this and pushed down the age for where this was true. Denying your kid a smart phone is basically denying them a social life nowadays. It simply doesn't work unless everyone does it.
You may be confusing what happens with a phone with what is required.
Certainly kids can have a social life without a phone. It’s not required. I just had a kid who didn’t get instagram until 14. They claimed that their life was ruined, but they had a healthy social life without it (and without a phone).
I think people generalize what will happen without things they think are common incorrectly. Just because phones are used for many things, it doesn’t mean those things are impossible without phones.
I do think it works better if more parents did it and it was so nice to find other parents (super rare) who felt similarly.