Inspired by another thread, at what age do you plan on getting (or did you get) your child a cell phone? For the yoinger members here, when did/will you get your own phone?
It does seem almost necessary for kids to have cell phones. When I was in high school, they started doing away with pay phones, they also announced school meetings/clubs/sports THAT day, and while I’m sure you could call from the bigger offices, that meant finding someone there who could help, being late to class because of waiting on a line to use a phone, and I’m pretty sure during class time they wouldn’t let you, except in the nurse’s office which meant you had to lie to get a nurse’s pass. That was 12 years ago, so I’m sure it’s way worse today.
You also need to submit most of your homework online by HS, even middle school, and notifications and assignments are also sent online. So while for families with regular desktop access wouldnt have any issues, families with busy schedule would likely have kids fighting over mom’s phone in the waiting room to check assignments and such. And cell phones have a lot of safety benefits, plus at 12 or 13 most kids are old enough to see a movie with a friend or hang out at the mall, and those places don’t have public phone access anymore.
That said, I’ve always liked the idea of having an extra “family” phone my kids could take with them when they go out or may stay after school, but now even that seems a little tough. I think it’s unlikely that in 10 years I’ll have a landline, and texting is replacing phone calls so much that I think it would be difficult for multiple middle/high schoolers to share a phone.
I think at this point, I’d be more inclined to let a child have their own phone at 12 or 13, with restricted Internet access and limited phone access - no phone during school hours, at the dinner table, during homework, or after 9pm, for example.
I got my first phone (that worked!) when I was 12, which was the BlackBerry Curve 8520 and it was on a contract that my dad controlled. Before that, I had other phones but they were pay-as-you-go ones and so, being so young, I never had any money to top it up so it was rarely used. I wasn’t restricted on the phone I had, but phones were banned in school anyway and I was there from 8 to 3 every day so it was only used for an hour before school and a few hours after. I wasn’t allowed it up the dinner table and I was pretty sensible with it - I didn’t have it out when I was doing homework and the battery life was awful so it was plugged in to charge quite a lot, too. I wasn’t technically allowed it when I was in bed, but because I used it as an alarm clock it couldn’t be confiscated, although I did get quite a telling off if I was caught!
For my own children when I have them, I think I’ll be the same. I’ll let them play with old, tatty phones that have no wifi and you can only play games on when they so wish (probably around 5 or 6, like myself), but they’ll only get their own phone when they’re 11/12 and in high school. I live in quite a safe area and, if I stay around here when I have children, the high school is only a 10 minute walk down the road so the journey won’t be long in the mornings and afternoons. There is a landline in my home but nobody [name_u]EVER[/name_u] answers it and so if we’re needed, they call us on our mobiles because they know we’ll pick up. I assume it’ll be like that in a few years to come when landlines become nothing but a nuisance, and so mobile phones will be more of a necessity then. I think, with my own children, I will keep them on pay-as-you-go until they can afford their own £10-20 a month contract (so around 15/16), so then I can keep track of what they’re spending and making sure the phone is only used when they need it, like calling home to tell them they’ll be late or asking for a friend round.
I was 14 when my mom and I got a shared cell phone with limited minutes, that I only used for pick-ups from after school programs/team practices and the rest of the time it was hers. When I was 15 I got my own phone and line on her plan, but it had pretty limited minutes, no texting. Although I’m way too young to be all “back in MY day”, phones didn’t have internet access then so that was a non-issue. But I do remember begging my friends not to text me because it was 25 cents per text, received or sent. I remember she wanted me to have one before I got started learning to drive, in case of emergencies. I think we got a plan with texting on it right around the time I went to college, but I never had data/internet access until I started paying for my own cell phone well into college years.
I want to say 12 or 13 is a good age at this point, but by the time my kid is that age things may have changed drastically. By then it might be reasonable for him to have a cell phone (with limited internet access/apps) at age 10 or it might work out that we can wait until he’s 14 or 15. Who knows. I’m just going to go with the flow, because as stodgy as I am when it comes to all the screen time kids get now, it’s becoming a necessary evil.
I got my first phone when I was 11, but it only worked for texting, calling and some games, and I only was charged enough credit for emergencies and had free calls to my parents. When I was 13, I got my first real phone, with Internet access but still on a limited credit. Now I’m several years older and I have no rules for my phone, except for the obvious security ones and limited credit, but my parents can check my conversations and everything.
However, I think it depends. I’ve got a friend whose parents are divorced, and her younger brother got a completely functional phone when he was 7 so that he could be in contact with either parent.
I think when my kids are starting to go places without us or another adult. I’m not sure when that will be exactly but probably 12 or 13. If not before high school then we will get one when they start. Our county provides laptops for all students so I think we wouldn’t so much need it for assignments. We also might do one shared phone between kids depending on how often they need it.
As feberin says above, when they are starting to go places on their own/with other adults. I do think this can reasonably vary a lot- my nephew was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at age 9 and his parents had shared custody, so he got a phone then.
I would definitely restrict the use of it heavily- no phones after bedtime (they still sell separate alarm clocks!) no phones at the dinner table, and I get to check the phone whenever. I also have high expectations about phone etiquette. I think giving a young teenager a phone can be a powerful tool, really. If you give the kid a phone, you can take the phone away if it is being used inappropriately, distracting from studies, etc.
This probably makes me sound old, but I would still have a landline in the house. If a hurricane or blizzard knocks power out for days, I need some way to be connected to family and cell phones won’t stay charged for that long (assuming the cell towers are functional). Also, if you call 911 they are sure to know your location from a landline, which isn’t necessarily true for a cell. Not only that, but kids these days (…just to make me sound even more old) don’t realize how useful landlines were back in the 90s. Send a signal to your parents if you didn’t want to talk to someone or you wanted the conversation to end and presto you were saved
I received a cell phone when I was about 13; I had after school activities and my parents wanted to make sure I could contact them in case of an emergency. I do think it’s important to have one when driving or being in the car with others. I think a lot of it comes down to situational factors (after school activities, health risks, etc.) and maturity. If you don’t think the child is mature enough to have their own cell phone, I’d go with a shared phone for a while. Maybe start with a phone that doesn’t allow internet or game usage and that can change depending on behavior and maturity.
I got my first phone at 11 out of pure necessity. My dad worked nights so many times he was just getting home as I was leaving for school and he’d be getting ready for work when I got home at 3 and I was responsible for getting my brother home from school later in the day. Mom worked until late at night so I NEEDED a phone for the time I wasn’t in the house and had access to a landline.
I didn’t get mine till middle school and it was just a crappy flip phone, so I would be able to call my parents in emergencies or when I need them to come pick me up. I think I would be fine with giving a phone to my child when they start school for emergency purposes, but it would only have calling/texting capabilities. It wouldn’t have games/internet access on it, that would be restricted until they were in high school. Heck, I didn’t have my first smart phone till I was in my twenties.
I got my first phone, a flip phone, when I was 10 and just starting fifth grade. The only reason I got a phone was because I walked from my school to daycare everyday and my parents wanted me to text them when I got there. My younger sister though is 12 and only has an iPod and I have a freshman friend who only just recently got a phone.
As a high schooler I know how nice it is to have a phone. We do BYOD (bring your own device) at my school so we have a lot of projects that requires researching stuff online. I also have google docs on my phone and it’s nice to be able to type my essays from my bed!
I will most likely give my kids phones at the start of middle school depending on how much schools depend on kids having their own devise in 15 or so years.
I got my first cell phone at 12 for my 6th grade graduation. It was a very basic flip phone which only had like 7 contacts in it. I was entering middle school and my parents wanted a way to contact me when I walked home. I got my first smart phone( a blackberry of some sort) in High school and then got an android phone in college as it was very important for me to be able to check my email all over campus and a moments notice. My sisters all got their phones about the same age. My youngest sister who is 11 often uses an extra cell phone we have around the house. Very soon she will get her own cell phone, probably for [name_u]Christmas[/name_u] at this point.
I think I got my first around 13 or 14, maybe even younger like 12? We didn’t have texting capabilities…I’m not even sure that was a possibility then, and it wasn’t much time after my parents got their first phones.
I distinctly remember texting a friend from a field trip around age 15, but I think I only had that temporarily, like maybe my parents paid for texting for a month and then stopped because they didn’t use it? Since I hardly used the phone in HS they canceled it and I didn’t get another til after I was 18. At that point most of my friends had them, but not for long. I think I was 21 or 22 when I got a smart phone, which I needed for work and school (I’m 25 now).
I guess if they were around when I was younger, i probably would have had one. My parents never had rules about them and they liked to try to out-do each other with gifts/privileges after their divorce.
I use the landline where I live now, sometimes. To call my cell phone when I misplace it, lol.
I got my first phone when I got my drivers license. (So, 16) I don’t think the pp suggestion of 12 is unreasonable though, especially if your children are away from home a lot (at school, with friends etc) I don’t think kids need a fancy smart phone/iphone though. A nice phone for texting friends and making emergency calls, maybe a few games etc is more than sufficient [name_f]IMO[/name_f]. I don’t like it when kids are too tied to their devices and don’t learn how to converse and socialize properly.
I probably wouldn’t give my kids a phone of their own until 13, maybe have a family phone to give them when they go to a friend’s or something. At the rate technology is moving, sometimes I worry there will be a totally different set of issues facing us by the time my kids get to that age, so I’m not going to worry too much about making rules for that just yet.
