Advice on mobile device for child

Superjakes

Superjakes

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Good morning, good people. Thanks for clicking on my thread!

So, my son is turning 6 later this year and is now in grade R. So far, we have been successful in not turning his eyes square with a tablet/phone, but I am looking to give him a device now. A tablet would be my preference, but since I have an iPhone 11 that is not being used, I will probably start with that.

Here comes the question part. How do I set it up - do I create an email address and subsequent Apple ID for him and link it to the family? Can I avoid having to do a whole email address? Any other parental control apps to be recommended? I want to load the Lego and ScratchJr for him, anything else (apart from streaming services) to be loaded? Am I making a huge mistake or am I doing this too late?

I should add that we're leaving on holiday with a 12 hour drive over the weekend, and this is also influencing my decision to pull the trigger on this.

Thanks!
 
Little cousin is in Grade R this year too. She has access to a phone (old Samsung) which she used for YT Kids but ever since an iPad arrived a couple months ago she hasn't touched the phone more than a handful of times.

Apple Arcade is amazing and I'd assume the vast majority of those games would work on an updated iPhone 11 too. Only parental control I see on hers is just requiring a password before any purchases but then again, she only gets up to 1% of the mischief of her brother so I guess the restrictions depend on each kid.
 
Google Family Link is great in terms of parental controls and setting up limits in terms of screen time and access to apps etc.. how compatible that is with Apple, I can't tell you..

My MIL unfortunately bought my two kids tablets for Christmas.. I was wanting to hold out on getting them their own devices until their teens.. anyway, have setup screen limits for them, so they are not glued to the tablets the whole day..

As for your 12 hour car ride, a vital part of life is learning to be and having patience and finding ways to keep yourself busy whilst waiting.. I would probably split screen time across the 12 hours with at least an hour in between each screen time session and maybe limit to total 4 hours screen time.. there are many things to see out the window, many games to play with them whilst driving too..
 
Get them into currency farming asap. Eighter digital or Freelancing. They need to help pay.
 
WAslayer said:
Google Family Link is great in terms of parental controls and setting up limits in terms of screen time and access to apps etc.. how compatible that is with Apple, I can't tell you..

My MIL unfortunately bought my two kids tablets for Christmas.. I was wanting to hold out on getting them their own devices until their teens.. anyway, have setup screen limits for them, so they are not glued to the tablets the whole day..

As for your 12 hour car ride, a vital part of life is learning to be and having patience and finding ways to keep yourself busy whilst waiting.. I would probably split screen time across the 12 hours with at least an hour in between each screen time session and maybe limit to total 4 hours screen time.. there are many things to see out the window, many games to play with them whilst driving too..
Click to expand...
Thanks - I was thinking of limiting screen time aggressively in any case - 30 min per day, but being a little lenient during the drive. He does sleep quite a bit during long drives like that, but I totally agree with the "boredom nurtures creativity" type approach you advocate.

The device would be more of a long term introduction. We are limiting TV time as far as possible since he started grade R as well, he is very keen on building stuff with his Legos after school and I like that, but I would like to expose him to coding and the like - ScratchJr was recommended by his teacher.
 
I'm also wanting to get my eldest a phone, 12yr old.
He has an ipad but want the phone for emergencies etc.
Tracking, sos calls if there are issues - are there any free apps they all sub based at like R1000p/y
 
Either use Google Family control or Apple Parental control, you mentioned iPhone 11... so check this out for features and how to set it up

Use parental controls on your child's iPhone, iPad and iPod touch

With Content & Privacy Restrictions in Screen Time, you can block or limit specific apps and features on your child’s device. You can also restrict the settings on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch for explicit content, purchases and downloads, and privacy.
support.apple.com support.apple.com
 
Hemps said:
I'm also wanting to get my eldest a phone, 12yr old.
He has an ipad but want the phone for emergencies etc.
Tracking, sos calls if there are issues - are there any free apps they all sub based at like R1000p/y
Click to expand...
Does he have his own Apple ID or is he using yours? I need to start this thing up... An email address for a 5 year old feels weird.
 
Superjakes said:
Does he have his own Apple ID or is he using yours? I need to start this thing up... An email address for a 5 year old feels weird.
Click to expand...

I know, how do you pick that mildly offensive and inappropriate first email address for them? especially with all the good ones already taken

[email protected]?
 
So, we are android here
Both kids have A32's.. both running My Family link,

Eldest got whatsapp at 12, youngest will get it in 2 years
As for emails, We just created two, if they want to use them going forward, cool, else, what ever... its an email, its free

Personally, I prefer the phone to a tablet, easier to carry around, easier to charge etc, tablets can be bulky and kids dont like holding up things for extended time

Get youtube kids,
and a kids netflix profile.
 
marbro said:
So, we are android here
Both kids have A32's.. both running My Family link,

Eldest got whatsapp at 12, youngest will get it in 2 years
As for emails, We just created two, if they want to use them going forward, cool, else, what ever... its an email, its free

Personally, I prefer the phone to a tablet, easier to carry around, easier to charge etc, tablets can be bulky and kids dont like holding up things for extended time

Get youtube kids,
and a kids netflix profile.
Click to expand...
Thanks - good points raised. He has been watching Youtube kids, netflix and disney+ on the TV, so the services exist for him. I would like to not transfer them to the phone before needed, to make it more interactive for now. But whether it will work in practice, I don't know.
 
Would also recommend an android with Google Family Link.
You can manage all aspects, screen time, apps etc.
Since he's six he'll break the device before long in any case , go cheap.
 
Hemps said:
I'm also wanting to get my eldest a phone, 12yr old.
He has an ipad but want the phone for emergencies etc.
Tracking, sos calls if there are issues - are there any free apps they all sub based at like R1000p/y
Click to expand...

I was 10 years old and bugged my parents like crazy for a phone. Got it and was finally able to chat with my friends afterschool, etc. And that was when the tech was in its infancy, Mxit was just starting out, data very limited etc (showing my age here...)

How has your 12 year old managed to have a social life outside of school without a phone?
Like, does he use your phone if he wants to text the cute girl in his class to see how her day went... Nee man. If you raised him right give him a phone right now and the Wifi password lol
 
Might have raised his spawn right,
doesnt mean the other kids were

My lighty showed me the group chats they are in, (For class etc)

bunch of freaking sailors in there...
 
So my view having experience with a daughter aged 15 now and a son aged 9 now.

My daughter got her first "phone" at age 8, old hand me down and good job too as it did not last all that long (dropped one time to many).

My son got his first hand me down at age 7 but this was given to the grand parents as he goes there after school and was given to them at their request (something to stop him driving them up the wall when his homework was done).

Anyway, family link is amazing till the kids turn 13, then you get an email informing you that since SA considers kids old enough at that age google is now killing all your abilities to lock the phone and set limits.

This caused homework issues and my daughters school marks dropped, She failed a term, it became a problem where she would be telling us she is doing her homework but you would see the online activity, I would confiscate it and she would go pull it out of my cupboard and carry on using it sneakily.
That got to the point where I ended up bending the phone in half and telling her no phones till there is a drastic improvement in her attitude and schoolwork. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance followed by marks improving, attitude improving and a bit of peace of mind.

Eventually when she was 14, before we went on holiday I decided to let her use my old phone to take photos and stuff with her old sim card in it. This was a test from our side to see if she is finally ready for this.
The phone still had all my accounts on it and I decided to leave it that way as I was already past the point of using social media and had nothing in there to hide from her anyway.

She changed my instagram and facebook profiles around to suit her and queue the predators and grooming.
Anyway, not going to say much more than that but there are certain interactions a father should not have to see, instead I will leave that part of this wall of text with two lines from a song:

"God, it's hard to be innocent
When the world keeps showing you it's dick"


The response from my wife and myself, as well as the realisation of how truly ****ed up the internet really is has had a very positive effect.

She does have a phone now, around a year later but she is much more responsible with it, it does not affect her school work and she has learned the lesson of just how dangerous the internet, and life can be for women.

As for my son.

As said earlier, he is 9 now, it is great that I can still approve and deny him apps and websites and all the rest on the phone, it is also used as a reward system and to get him to do his chores and homework, life is so much simpler at 9.

Of course the same boy used to play minecraft on my pc, on my account, till he bought close to R3000 worth of addons on my microsoft account linked to my credit card...
 
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