This was the argument from the teacher when we complained about them not restricting the issued ipads to only the school related things. Their argument was that kids should learn to control themselves.
If my kids were left to control themselves, they’d not be going to school and would be having chocolate for every meal!
Yes the same refrain I heard over and over again - they should learn how to learn for tests etc by themselves, they should handle bullying by themselves etc etc.
I agree, but in this case I said it should be done in a controlled environment, and also said it’s a balance. I’m not sure an outright ban (or near to) is any better an approach as total freedom on phones/social media.
Probably down to the personality of the child, too. If you’re lucky and they C.B.A with that kind of thing you have a relatively easy (different?) ride. If they’re mad keen on consuming TikTok or whatever, you need to decide whether you’re going the route of the iron fist or use it as a teachable moment. Negotiate, agree on exceptions, and what happens if they can’t show you that they can stick with the rules.
Also down to the individual child, obviously, too. My son prefers this kind of agreement route for many aspects, and also enjoys pointing out to me when I’ve run foul of it 
. But it gives a starting point for them to make their own decisions as well as a non-emotional way of picking them up on it when taking the piss.
My lad is mid teens so have to say there’s push back and challenges and it often ends in ‘words’ but I like to think the structure of the ‘negotiation’ helps a bit.
I think this approach depends on the age of the kids. We never had a TV when they were younger and no phones either.
I think the issue with the tablets given at school is that as parents you are told to limit the online time and then school gives them a tablet you have absolutely no control over. A bit like giving them a gun and telling parents to ensure they are not shooting.
This approach probably works with some kids and others are really affected negatively. I have one of each at home
Not sure what’s the deal with the tv tbh; it is and was much easier to ensure control over watch time than over you tube watch time for instance.
For me, it wasn’t a big deal - it just wasn’t a deal at all. When I left home I never got one, never missed it and left it at that.
But I agree - dealing with TV time and kids is so much easier than phone and tablet time.
I know, my point entirely. Each of them is different, has different interests but always find a common ground. Personally I can’t really complain about any of my kids because they seem to be able to handle social media, phone and tablet time within some restrictions we have tried to impose. Not all the time…but such is life.
There is a few years difference between mine that counted more when they were little and we had a lot of drama a few years ago. But as they grow up they seem to get along much better and they seem to enjoy stupid stuff on social media which is not that bad as I thought.
I learned not to give advice to any parent out there because frankly I’m pretty annoyed too by some folks I used to be friends with. I am always interested in other people’s experiences as long as I don’t get involved too much…I guess.
To me it’s much worse. Phones and tablets have apps and settings that can limit the screen time. My daughter is watching some old TV series on Netflix and wants to watch as many episodes per day as she can. The settings on kids profile on Netflix are very basic. I cannot limit neither time nor number of episodes. I can only set maturity rating and add a black list of shows, that will be blocked completely. The only advantage of TV is that it is in the living room so it’s easy to see what the kid is watching right now.
We block the TV on the WiFi app at night as we caught our kids watching late. Perhaps you can also?
I don’t like Netflix business model exactly for this issue because it basically makes one binge on it. But…she’s already 14, right? My older daughter too was losing way too much time with it so we mentioned Netflix is shit and we plan to get rid of the subscription unless everyone agrees that it’s mainly for weekends and even then no more than say two hours per day. She seemed to resonate with this argument. And the tricky part is she wants to spend time with her friends on weekends so the temptation is not so big anymore…and she knows we will not make any compromise about Netflix because neither OH nor I am watching any series (just a movie here and there) so the reasons to just give it up are quite good. Alternatively, you might as well try to remove the temptation altogether - take off her hands the tablet or laptop at night.
By loosing time do you mean that she is supposed to do something else in her free time? I personally think that Netflix is great. We never had a consistent subscription before the last few months. I used a free “trial” month occasionally, while it was still available, to watch something like The Witcher (which was my favourite book, when I was young) or Black Mirror. I watch something very rarely, and my husband never at all.
I think that it’s a good thing that she watches older series from 90-s/00-s, not the bulshit that is released nowadays. It’s important for a teenager to see how do people interact with each other and how do they solve their problems, especially how they did it in the “before smartphones” era. It’s much better, than watching Tiktok or YouTube Shorts. So I am not against it in general, I’m just looking for a way to set a certain limit.
We don’t have problems with nights, because the kids should go to their bedrooms at certain time and the devices and/or internet access is blocked.
Yeah, I used to think that too but then I looked more carefully at the new series and I changed my mind. 
And we watched old series in the summer holidays of the 5th and 6th grades together…when she didn’t even have real friends to begin with. Thing is there is not so much free time during the week because she has two hobbies already and she has to study more… It was a nightmare dealing with school stuff like Latin and French for instance and there is no shortcut than applying yourself. Math is her favourite subject so far (though now she’s talking about medicine as a potential future path) and everything else is a bit meh. She’s in a gymi class where most kids are serious nerds that read real books, which I thought it was an extinct species (younger child would do anything else other than reading a book btw) and she has to keep up with them.
My hubby is a softie and wants to apply soft methods and is tired of blocking anything so I just remove the temptations in the evening. They argued that we use our phones etc but we were firm and said adults are allowed to do more things than kids because we didn’t grow up with smart phones and tablets and just read books or played computer games instead. Everything is on a trial and error basis so we’ll see.
“So you’re saying that the schools including all teachers are useless and a waste of money because the children should teach themselves instead”.
Something like that should shut up the nonsensical rhetoric rather fast.
Sorry, you’re going to have to flesh out that post because it’s difficult to see what point you are trying to make. Especially as you’re just quoting out-of-context posts and half-sentences. 
I don’t understand the problem of school iPads. In our schools the kids are only allowed to use them at school for certain tasks during the very limited periods of time, definitely not in every lesson. Not even every day. And they are not allowed to take them home with the exception of lockdown in 2020. According to my son, they have some dedicated search system which only gives some very safe and limited results. I don’t see any bad influence of school iPads on kids.
Here the kids take them home and have to do homework on them etc. Of course, you catch them watching youtube etc. when they were supposedly doing homework. If the iPad was just at school, then it wouldn’t be such an issue at all.
Ours are still young, and hopefully a good 8-10 years away from teenage drama, but maybe by then the norm will be smartphones from birth…
However, I remember cell phones were starting to become an issue around the age of 12-14, even 25 years ago -even though back then it was just about SMS texting at the equivalent of 10 cents per message 
My plan of attack is show them other interesting stuff and hopefully keep them “hooked” on these. Physical activities, books, video games and focus on single player stuff. Famous last words? Naivete? Freaking hope not, but at least we have time…
Kids get hooked on video games too. I prefer if they do the multi-player stuff to be honest as at least they get to chat with other people from other countries.
It’s really difficult - they seem to get to a certain age and then lose interest in a lot of things.
The big problem with social media/video games is that whilst they are doing these things, they are missing out on everything else which they should be doing for brain/boy development.
It’s not all bad. One of mine learnt chess to a high standard playing online and now refuses to play me as it’s too tiresome for him to win every time!
Mine still play musical instruments and sports but they have no interest in reading despite us having hundreds of books in the house.
I try leading by example - my phone is generally out of site at home but that doesn’t work either.
You are scare mongering. Surveys are not facts. They are just surveys using a very small sample number. Typically 1000 participants are used as this is supposed to give some kind of statistical small error of margin. This is total bullshit as it depends on it being possible to get a representative sample with this number. Add to this this the highly likely possibility that responders are quite likely today to find it funny to give “interesting” answers and you have a recipe for fake news. Does social media have a more positive or negative effect? Nobody knows. Nobody knows what the majority of teenagers think. Social media does change the game, but that is the future for better or worse.