PHONES & KIDS

I was very confident in the 13-y-o thing but the realities of secondary school have shaken that conviction

I have Downtime enabled on both which is actually a huge help but it does mean that every five minutes I’ve pinged for access to something. Also their homework requires them to have access to YouTube which is just enraging because there’s no simple way to turn access on or off to specific websites, so I just have to have it on. It’s insane. It’s like setting a hungry kid in front of a big bowl of M&Ms and saying “don’t eat those! I’m going out of the room for an hour now”

Ha, our 13-year-old recently updated her Twitter account from 2004 or whatever to 2007 and immediately got her account suspended.

Her takeaways were 1.) She shouldn't have been on there in the first place and 2.) Why should it be so important to give a social network an accurate birthdate anyway?

We take our kids' (12 & 14) phones at night during the week - at 10pm. X-box fuckery aside, it's still the single biggest cause of conflict in the house. I teach secondary (12-16 in the UK) and it's a daily message that we're doing the right thing, though: the kids who clearly have their phones at all times are a nightmare of exhaustion and stale electricity.

I think that 10pm rule is a good one. We recently accidentally left her laptop that she has for school purposes in her room one night. She stayed on it until nearly midnight & was predictably a bear to deal with the next day.

My friends' 12 year old has Snapchat but not Tik Tok, but apparently keeps up with all the Tik Tok influencers through instagram. Largely however he learns & uploads dances on Dubsmash. This is all I know from my world of young person.

Can you guys get this all sorted out in the next 5 years please, then tell me the answer, cheers