QOTD: Does Your Child Have a Cell Phone? Why?
You most likely remember days when the lucky kids at school were the ones with phones in their rooms. There may have been one girl or guy with their own private line and they were envied.
Nowadays, most teenagers have cell phones. However, the age at which kids start to want phones seems to be falling at an alarming rate. A friend of mine recently told me his 8-year-old can't wait to get a phone and while he isn't quite at the begging and reasoning stage, he's definitely eager to get his hands on one because several of his friends have cell phones already.
Eight is extremely young to be asking for a cell phone but it's not at all unusual for 10-, 11- and 12-year-olds to have phones. The New York Times cites a recent study that says 58 percent of 12-year-olds now have a cell phone. Safety appears to be the biggest reason for parents purchasing cell phones for kids. Whether it's camping trips with the Girl or Boy Scouts, birthday parties at bowling alleys or walking home from school with their friends, parents want to know their children can contact them if there's an emergency.
That said, there are always disagreements among parents about the right age to buy a child a phone. Some prefer to to give their son or daughter a 'house' or communal cell phone when they go away on trips. This solves the safety issues without actually having to buy them a phone. Others like the idea of the Firefly phone, a handset that can only call a handful of numbers (such as Mom, Dad, and Home).
Today's Question of the Day is: How old was your child when you bought him or her a cell phone and what made you buy it? If you don't have children, what age do you think is the right age?
- Smartphones ,
- Cell-Phones ,
- Firefly ,
- QOTD
- Massive AT&T Breach Exposes A-Listers' iPad Data
- VOTW: Calling Tech Support Over Google Pacman
- DRM: Is Steamworks The Way to Go?
- Google Update Promises 50% Fresher Results
- We May Know Valve's Big Super Secret
- Boy Saves Sister From Moose Using WoW Skills
- iPhone 4: Who Needs the iPad Now?
- Educational Math-Based FPS Ignites Protest
- Google Gives HP Printers Own Email Addresses
- MSI's GT660 Gaming Notebook Gets Spec'd
- Crysis 2 Beta Program Announced
- Foxconn Considering Moving Production to Taiwan
- VIDEO: First StarCraft II TV Commercial (Hotness)
- Windows 7 Vulnerable to Memory Attack
- Team Fortress 2 50% Off, Free to Play at Weekend
- MSI Ships 17'' GX740 with Radeon 5870, Core i7
- Asus Announces AMD Geode-based EeePC
- Dell: Ubuntu Safer than Windows
i think i was 13-14ish when i got one but that was like 7 years ago so i wouldn't be suprised if the age had gone down alot now
Honestly, I won't give my kids their own personal phones until they're at least 18. I got my phone after I finished secondary school at 17, at I went to a government boarding school some 200 kilometres from home (boarding schools in my country Malaysia is more like a military school - prison hybrid by the way) and I'm stuck calling home weekly using payphones, provided they don't break down; in the end, I still turned out allright; graduating top in my class and got a scholarship to study abroad.
My younger siblings on the other hand got their phones really early at 13 or so, and it absolutely messed up their studies; you really can't depend on kids to sufficiently balance their schoolwork and social lives. I always see my siblings gossiping on the phone or just wasting time on whatever apps there are on the phone while they should be studying.
I fully support the idea that a family should have one or two communal mobile phones for the younger kids to use when necessary (during trips, etc) but to to give them their own phone before before they can prove themselves to be responsible enough to handle it is a complete no-no.
Daddy can I have a phone?
NO, but you can have boxing lessons.
Why?
So you can deal with the bullies when they taunt you about not having a phone.
Job done.
Honestly I don't really see the problem... They can have one by 5th grade (whatever age that is). Its still a privilege, meaning they can have as long as the do well at school and all that and they would have to pay for the calls out of their allowance.
Wouldn't be much of a cellphone if given but they would be allowed to buy a more decent one with their money if they wanted to.
Alright so I got curious
5th grade (here in Portugal) is around 11 years old.
I might give it before if the kid showed enough skill at managing his allowance though.
My son bought his own when he started his morning paper round at 13, with money he earnt himself. Just a basic Nokia. My daughter is 10, and has an old one of mine with no SIM card just to play with. She can have a real one when she starts earning money to pay for it. She'll be at least 13.
What about the risks from radiation when kids brains are still developing?
I got my first cell phone as I was still in highschool about 16-or 17 years old (that was almost 15 years ago)...I got it as a birthday present...wow...it was huge and heavy...you can kill a dog by throwing the cellphone towards the ...hehehehe
My opinions for giving an underaged kid a cellphone :
1. Giving a child a so called child's cellphone, which can only dial not more than 10 fixed numbers is a good thing so that the child can learn to use that technology as early as possible and perhaps helps the parrents to gain some control of the child when the child is away from home or to begin teaching responsibility.
2. Cellphone radiation could have bad influence to a child's brain
3. Bad psychological impact could happend like cellphone dependency, etc.
4. If the child is not yet capable of having a good understanding that it takes money to make a phone call or worse if the child still doesn't understand the meaning of money...well...you go a problem there mate!
5. If the other children around the child all have already a cellphone...well...not having one could be a little problematic..saying "No, you can't have a cellphone untill 18!"...that won't solve the problem...
BTW :
@Waxdart : learning self defense is always a very good thing but teaching the kid to use violence to deal with the bullies who taunts
about not having a phone ...I don't know if that is really a good solution...
Giving a child a cell phone is a good way to encourage bullying. Text message bullying is becoming a real problem in schools. At least with normal bullying you have to be in the presence of the person to be the object of their abuse, with a cell phone you're a target 24/7
I have 2 children, one 18, one 10. The 18yo has a phone (obviously) and several of my 10yo friends have phones. Hence she regularly asks when she can have one too. I can see no valid reason for her to have one. All her friends live within the same area, they see each other every day. We know where she is at all times, so we don't need to contact her. Until she is in a situation where she is outside of direct contact with us she won't have one.
Cell phones may or may not cause damage through radiation, but one thing they do cause is loss of the ability to express yourself in proper english language. Text speak is destroying our children's ability to construct coherent, grammatically correct sentences. This is similar to giving young children calculators before they are comfortable with doing maths manually.