My parents didn’t get me a phone until after they forgot to pick me up from school and I was left there for three hours. And even then it was a fliphone.
That story is incredibly disturbing…
Only one 11-year-old girl in an entire class did not have a smartphone…?
How long has smartphone ownership and normalized for that age? What age did they first get them?
That’s got to be wreaking havoc on their developing minds…to say nothing of their social development.
I guess what I’m trying to say is, go long on pharma.
Pretty sure kids get phones before they can speak these days. Because flashy lights keep them entertained when otherise they’ll just yell and scream.
Just because a kid has a phone, it doesn’t necessarily mean they have full access to it. My daughter has had her own phone since she was 3 years old, she is now 8 and still rarely gets access to her phone - maybe an hour a week on Saturday mornings or if we’re going on a long drive. There’s never any fights when she has to put it away, and she’s learning good device usage habits.
When she gets to teenager age, just make sure to let her live a little.
I’m unclear how your comment relates to the article, or my comment. Because even if I took you at your word, your anecdotal story would still seem to place you as an outlier, maybe.
Clearly an entire class of preteens, minus one girl, has full access to their smartphones, and I’m betting at least a portion of them had just as much access when they were 8 years old.
Also, not for nothing, but you might want to consider the possibility that a child’s usage and behaviors on a smart device might change once it becomes an unsupervised activity. Or maybe it won’t, I don’t know you or your child, so who am I to say.
I was providing context to your question about how long it’s been normalized and when kids get their first phones.
And yes, as a parent I know that I won’t be able to control everything my kid does as she ages, however I think by creating good habits and setting healthy boundaries it will help her make the right choices later in life.
I need your notes. My daughter is 2.5. I would appreciate if you can share your experience, how is it working, how you set the rules of engagement, etc.
I think it started with TV being regulated. At first we were strict about only giving her access to ‘educational’ shows, so a lot of PBS Kids shows like Daniel Tiger, but we also did YouTube channels like Super Simple Songs. We avoided anything too commercialized or designed to sell toys (Paw Patrol), but that caused issues when she went to preschool and didn’t know any of the shows and characters the other kids knew, so we relaxed a little, but treated Paw Patrol as a treat (she’d be limited to 30 minutes of it, but could then switch to something on PBS). And even PBS screen time was limited to certain times of the day. It never really became an issue because she never knew any other way.
For the phone, a few years ago on Google Fi it was actually the same price to have 3 lines as it was to have 2 lines, and I had an extra phone and so it just made sense to activate it so she had a phone to use in the car while we took a 12 hour car ride. It worked really well, and she knew that ‘her phone’ would always go right back in my pocket when she wasn’t using it. We also got her some Bluetooth headphones and we’ve taught her that her phone should not make any sound that anyone else can hear when we’re in public. We’re trying to find that balance between making sure she has the skills needed to use technology, but also doesn’t become dependent on it like the rest of us are. I’m not sure it will work in the long-term, but I do know that my family won’t be the ones behind you in a restaurant with the kid playing a loud game on her phone.
Off topic, but it’s very funny to me that you think you have full access to your phone.
I mean, I have a Pixel 9 Pro running Graphene, but sure this isn’t like my Pine phone (which is fun to pay with but a slog as a daily driver).
Better than most, privacy wise. Better than me, especially the pine phone (again, privacy wise). But still not solely your phone. The pine phone might be. You are on the right way though!
You know what they fuckin meant, ya dweeb.
Yeah
On the one hand, the grumpy old man in me agrees completely.
On the other, they’ve been saying this for all of history, since that new-fangled writing wreaked havoc on our ancestors’ children’s memories. And it did in fact do that, but we changed.
Attention span is just going to become vestigial in the general population as it becomes less necessary in an evolving technological and sociological environment, just like memory and penmanship.
You might want to take a look at this: https://jonathanhaidt.com/anxious-generation/
I’m sorry but not going to trust an author who has a very real financial incentive to sell a hypothesis. There are indeed numerous studies that do summarize the negative impacts of social media and smartphones on mental health, and it’s also extremely true that the increase in mental health diagnosis can also, at least partially, be attributed to an increase in mental health awareness. My ADHD existed well before I got my hands on tech.
EDIT: to summarize, I don’t really take issue with your comment, but I believe that you can find an even better source of information to link to when discussing this topic. Wishing you well!
I hear you. Not everything is because of the smart phones and social media. And I agree that awareness is increasing the diagnosis numbers.
I would be sceptical if I didn’t know of this random author as well. But look into him, at least check his Wikipedia article. Maybe see his TED talk. Read a couple interviews. Don’t accept my recommendation at face value.
There are a lot of people out there trying to make us feel lacking so they can sell something. But I don’t think Haidt is one of those people.
I learned a thing or two from his material. Your mileage might vary, obviously.
Shame. He’s a very good author
Yeah it’s not really up for debate, the science is only growing more conclusive on how smartphones negatively impact a developing brain, especially social media.
Also, attention span is not vestigial… It’s pretty important function of your brain, and can’t just be replaced by technology…but I was more referring to anxiety and depression disorders, which again, are on the rise.
I’m also kind of confused why you included penmanship in there, as that is not something a child’s development requires to be healthy. It’s simply a skill, and one that has been replaced by typing, almost 1:1.
Once upon a time people argued penmanship was crucial to building a well developed brain. Same with memorizing epics by rote. Books were actually considered bad for students because they would become dull and lazy if they did not commit all their knowledge to memory.
But memory can largely be replaced by technology, and that enables access to more knowledge than one person could ever memorize. Who knows how society will develop, for better or worse.
yes but in order to effectively use technology to replace memory you still have to commit things to memory. if I don’t know something exists then how can I Google it?
Attention isn’t eliminated by smartphones, just shortened
I’d smart devices are required for the lesson, the school should supply them.
Income tax from the rich should fund it. Especially large businesses and rich people.
In the states that’s exclusively how it’s done. No classroom activity would require private ownership of technology.
These people are supposed to be experts in child development.
Completely irresponsible for the school to be encouraging 11 year olds to have smart phones.
Most teachers are aware how bad smartphones are, at least from the surveys I’ve seen. They’re more skeptical of them than parents or children. I think this case is kind of an outlier.
All studies about this are still too recent to have reached your common school. Teachers fall exactly in the age span of people that can’t let go of their phones in an almost unhealthy way and probably were pretty excited, when they found this game online - to share with the kids.
That’s just my impression though
IANAL OR AP NOR AE
Ap nor ae?
Gonna guess,
not a lawyer, a parent, nor an educator.
Is probably what the abbreviations are for, given the context.
A q p
Fund education properly. That includes technology for students.
They offered her a laptop which would just single her out more.
Provide everyone laptops, or provide phones (tablets) for everyone.
I’m surprised everyone having laptops and using them for school isn’t standard. It’s been standard when I was in school here in Norway a decade ago
My freshman year of HS my tiny ass school (maybe 60 kids) all got iPads for the year
28 were broken, most smashed somehow, by the end of the year (I knew the IT guy outside of school and was shocked at this)
I’m not surprised at all given how poor many districts are/must be
Ms Lewis said she began to feel “pressure” on parents to buy smartphones as her daughter left primary school, but decided not to over fears about how it might affect Ava’s mental health.
Capitalism has brainwashed people.
This isn’t the same, but it reminds me of when I was a manager and got stuck with the weekends for awhile. Nothing at all happened on the weekends. So I told my team (I think there was 8 of us) that we could play some games to pass the time.
We settled on a party game, I think it might have been for the Switch. And I hooked it up to the giant TV we used for stats during the week. Everyone was excited. I was pumped.
Then the game forced everyone playing to download an app on their phone. The disappointment was audible.
Dumbest fcking thing ever for a game.
You don’t know Jack?
That sounds familiar, maybe
If so the phone component is totally a necessary part of the game and very warranted.
The game is about everyone typing out secret answers to a question. Not something you can do on a switch normally.
It all works very well, and actually, you don’t even need to download an app, you can just do it through the browser.
Had you gone through with it, you would have had a blast, it’s a great social game.
It just has a QR code you scan that takes you to the website. On that website you put in the short easy lobby code the console gives you and you easily join a private lobby without any hassle. Super low friction.
11? That is definitely too early.
