Phone for a 5 year old

akescpt

akescpt

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Shred said:
So, I wanted to look at getting a phone for my 5 year old son just to contact me when he's away from me so I thought of just getting a Nokia as all I needed is voice calling.

But then I thought that an Android would be nice for things like GPS tracking, giving him an alarm, etc. But I want to be able to restrict access so that he can't download any games (yes he knows how to do that :-D) or whatever.

Any ideas of devices that won't break the bank, have a good battery life and are robust? Doesn't need to have awesome specs, it just needs to be able to voice call and do some basic things.
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wtf. for a 5 year old. damn that's cruel. i understand the intention but not android or anything smart. his 5. have you and the ex even discussed this? if u must get that phone with the big numbers. heaven forbid you get him a smartphone, you will have to lock that thing down so comprehensively. there's a lot of bad out there. at 5 he shouldn't be at risk of all that.
 
Akasha

Akasha

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To be fair. People need to realize that times are changing and this is becoming an acceptable thing. Just because you didn't get these things when you were a child (because they didn't exist back then) doesn't mean children of today shouldn't. I agree that 5 years is a bit young but if it was my nephew, I'd give him whatever he wanted, I don't blame this guy for wanting to do the same for his son.
 
pinball wizard

pinball wizard

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I got divorced when my son was 6.

Maybe it was different for me as I got full custody and primary residence of the kids.

Dunno. Seems strange to me though, this giving a five year old a phone.

The kids are 10 and 14 now, and have phones that never leave the house, and time on them is limited. I also have the kids agreed that at any time I can take their phone and see what is what on it.
 
Akasha

Akasha

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pinball wizard said:
I got divorced when my son was 6.

Maybe it was different for me as I got full custody and primary residence of the kids.

Dunno. Seems strange to me though, this giving a five year old a phone.

The kids are 10 and 14 now, and have phones that never leave the house, and time on them is limited. I also have the kids agreed that at any time I can take their phone and see what is what on it.
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As far as I can see, this guy wants to get his kid a phone to be able to talk to him whenever he wants and to know where his child is. I think that's perfectly reasonable. Do you know where your kids are all the time?

(Alternatively he just wants the phone with the tracker so he can see what his ex wife is up to, which is not cool IMO)
 
ahoudet

ahoudet

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That GPS tracker looks good. Then you can track them if necessary and they can still call you from it
 
F

Fro

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pinball wizard said:
The kids are 10 and 14 now, and have phones that never leave the house, and time on them is limited. I also have the kids agreed that at any time I can take their phone and see what is what on it.
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I think at 14 he should be able to take his phone out of the house, and maybe get some privacy. It's always awkward when your parent reads what you said to Soekie from school. Worst case scenario: he watches some porn but he has probably already seen it somewhere else.

I'm not telling you how to parent your child, it has nothing to do with me. I'm just giving my 2c.:)

Regarding the OP, I think he will always be with someone that has a phone so he could just call you from that phone.
 
MidnightZA

MidnightZA

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What about one of those cheap Neotel mobile phones? It's like R200 or R300 and it takes 2 sims. We have 2 in the house and it works out cheaper to call neotel to neotel. A while back I remember neotel to neotel was free all day. I think they have changed that to after 6PM from a few months ago
 
Dairyfarmer

Dairyfarmer

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Zyraz said:
One of the reasons I reckon a Smart-GPS-Tracker watch is a better idea as you can phone from it but ONLY specified numbers.
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This function was available on phones before they had calculators (90's). It's called fixed dialling.

There are many child phones available that specifically have gps tracking and "sos" dialing.

I agree with a lot of posters here. My reasoning is that no 5 year old should be left without adult supervision unless they are asleep. As they get more independent then they need to be contactable (i.e. 12+). My son is 10 and has a phone but only carries it when he leaves the yard to go cycling or ride his quad on the farm. Also if he is sleeping out at a friends.
 
OMB

OMB

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Shred said:
I'm divorced so unfortunately he's away from me 50% of the time. And I would like him to be able to call me whenever he misses me.

I see there is a special on the LG Leon on MTN for R129pm.
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Ah, creating codependency at such an early age, good stuff...
 
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