When to give your child a phone

Starting high school is a popular time for children to get their first smartphone, but is it the best time? Does age determine if they are ready? Age can give you a clue but there are two other factors children need to be ready for when it comes to the new world of independence that owning a smartphone opens up.

They are:

1. Are they socially mature? Can they handle the flood of social interactions like group chat, posts, messages etc that will flood to their phone once they get one.

2. Can they make good life decisions? Owning a phone means being able to juggle information, data, vidoe, games, posts, messages and everything else that they can do. A child needs to be able to juggle and make good decisions, otherwise they won't be able to tear themselves away from it.

The Apprecticeship Model

When they do get their own phone, there needs to be a transition time- think of it as their phone apprenticeship where together you help them keep safe and learn to use it in the best ways. This is very different to an “I’m checking your phone because I don’t trust you” situation. It’s strengths based and it’s about learning and developing the right skills and approaches. Smartphones themselves are not bad- it’s all about how you use them. This gives them time to learn this. Around 12 weeks is needed for this apprenticeship and then they should be on their way to making good decisions with their phone independently.

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