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© KYODO51% of children in Japan get 1st smartphone at elementary school age: poll
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sakurasuki
Do they provide alternative how to contact their children while going to school, cram school or back to home? Smartphone is most available today. There's still plenty advantage using smartphone.
Randy Johnson
WobotToday 07:56 am JST
Completely unnecessary and exposes them to all sorts of weird stuff. If I have children they won't be allowed one until they're 18
Remember, you said it.
How it actually pans out for you in the future, I suspect will be another matter.
TokyoJoe
Sending a six year old child to 'cram school' is abuse. Let kids enjoy their childhood.
Mark
I think it helps some kids with their education and knowledge of their world, I also think that schools should start teaching safety classes on how to use these phones with the help of the providers, working together they can make these kids world a lot better and safer.
koiwaicoffee
Indeed.
My 11yo has one, offline, just for music and a couple of games. Half of her friends have had smartphones with full, unmonitored access to everything for a few years now. She will feel left out soon, without Line, tiktok and all the other cr*p other kids do.
Apart from the dangers or inappropriate content, a smartphone feels like a huge waste of time because they will spend hours with it instead of doing real life things like reading books or playing outside.
There's little we can do about it. My uni students confess an average of 4-6 hours a day with their devices.
shogun36
Simplified cell phones made for kids, for emergency calls and possible GPS Tracking, I understand. Sure. It should be the norm.
But giving a 7-10 year old access to social media and porn hub on the go……cmon now. For what?
Use common sense people.
commanteer
People who don't have children often assume that they are like pets that can be controlled at will rather than little human beings. It's not that simple. I didn't want my kids to have any such devices until they were 18 either - but life gets in the way. The older one got a phone in high school. That same high school required an iPad for all students. That was it - one kid was all in. The younger one gets exposed to it. The little friends all contact each other via Line, etc. - a kid without a phone in slowly marginalized.
On the plus side, they both did a lot of creative work on their devices. I think there's a big difference between passive use (watching YouTube, playing most games) and active use (creating art, music, animation and videos, coding, writing...) And they have access to information they need. And of course, we can stay in touch with them wherever they are. And it can be useful for them to make friends, especially when they don't have great friends at school. For the latter, it's just important that the parents and kids stay in communication about this. The kids have to learn about predators and how to avoid them. And they should be able to talk about their internet friends openly. No secret friends while they are still young. That way the parent some oversight. There are tools to help with this.
Rodney
Why isn’t it 100%. Same with computers. This is not the 19th century. People actually take holidays in space now and my whole house is powered by only sunlight.
mz16
Just get them a button phone like Nokia and internet problem is solved
GuruMick
I'm a Luddite and dont have a mobile phone , dont text and use computers for a limited range of things.
I'm happy I had a childhood where "playing " meant outside the house, and talking to friends was done in person.
So often I see a group of young people together, yet ALL looking at their phones. Sad outcome for technology.
My brother in law bought my wife a new smart phone....I call it a conversation buster.
{thinking grumpily ..... "things will be different when we move back to Australia "}
factchecker
If kids want a phone they should get a job and pay for it. Sponging off parents is no lesson in how to be responsible in life.
kohakuebisu
My eldest's had one for a while but only got a SIM when she went off to senior high. My son is 14 and has a phone but no SIM. Our WiFi locks him out at night. I gave them cheap Chinese phones but my daughter wanted an IPhone and worked to buy one herself. The reason was she couldn't do Airdrop file sharing with her mates. In a perfect world other people wouldn't buy children $500 plus phones but that's just the way it is.
Johansawada
My eldest daughter is 6 and she is always asking to play with either my wife's or my phone when we are out... my daughter is addicted to youtube and we've been trying to get her off it - not an easy task!
theResident
@Wobot : Which is precisely why your kids will grow up totally indoctrinated by the same weird beliefs as yourself and unable to form an opinion for themselves. You will deny them access to a variety of different opinions restricting them access to various news outlets which these days are only available on the Internet, since it is the Net that has through evolution has killed the sensible printed press.
The Avenger
When your child has a phone, you can easily get in touch with them in case of an emergency. This extra sense of security and safety is probably the only reason that parents should even consider getting a younger child a cell or smart phone.
Kag
Just do the best and lock down or set timers on the phone with apps and tools available.
Inspect the phone every once in a while to ensure the phone is compliant.
Sven Asai
Btw, you might very much laugh nowadays, but the discussions were the same or at least very similar at the times of my childhood, of course then it wasn’t about a smartphone but about the first wristwatch to be given or even brought to school etc. Of course, the opinions were similarly split among teachers, parents, ‘experts’.
We have all survived, the half who got their first wristwatch and the other half that were denied to wear one at the age of six or seven.