It’s not a question of if, but when
I started teaching in New York City in October, 2001, a month after the September 11 attacks. For classrooms across the country, September 11 ended the cell phone debate forever. My child must have a phone on them, parents said, in case of an emergency just like that one.
Recently, an article in The Atlantic perhaps rightly suggested that cell phones should be banned from schools. There are myriad reasons, from learning achievements to mental health concerns, and all of them are valid. Unfortunately, the argument has come too late. Pandora’s box had nothing on 5G networks.
Asking students to stop bringing phones to school would be like asking them to eat a balanced breakfast every day and get eight hours of sleep. It would make a huge difference in academic performance. It also seems like a totally unreasonable expectation in today’s real world.
I’ve alternated between my careers in tech journalism and teaching, and I recently spent a year in the classroom in a school near Washington, D.C.. I gave a lot of thought to how I wanted to handle smartphones in my class, as a phone reviewer and enthusiast, but also as an experienced teacher with academic goals, and finally as a parent, worried about the effect of phones on my own kid.
Here are guidelines about when to buy a phone, what phone to buy, and what to tell your child about smartphones and their place in school.Buy your child a phone when you need them to have one
My kiddo is currently 14 and he has had a smartphone for four years. If 10 seems young to have a smartphone, I moved away for a job for a while and wanted to keep in constant contact with him, so I bought him an iPhone 11 on the same day I bought myself an iPhone 11 Pro Max.
He knew how to use a phone much earlier than that, because I, like most parents, will casually hand my phone to a toddler to play with like it’s a toy. But he didn’t have his own phone until I needed him to have one.
If your kid is bugging you to buy them a phone, that’s the answer I suggest. “When can I have a phone?” You can have one when I need you to have one. No child actually needs a smartphone. If your life won’t be improved by your child’s smartphone, neither will theirs. Reasons why it’s useful for your kid to have a phone
You can always get in touch with them. If they ignore you, you can just lock their phone remotely. They’ll get the hint.
Every phone has built-in tracking so you can keep tabs on their location, and it’s easy to find a phone if they lose it.
