What are your phone rules for your 15 year old son?

[Anonymous]

DS is fighting every rule we have - about taking iphone to his room, screen time restrictions, that we must know his phone password and apple id password. I am curious what rules you have or don't have for your 15 year old son. Also, how common are your rules? Please help by sharing!

[Anonymous]

I would tell him either agree to the rules or the phone service gets shut off and the wifi password will be changed regularly and he will only have access with permission.

[Anonymous]

Apple ID to the phone is mine, nothing can be downloaded without me entering a password. Also no phones upstairs. Ever. They are left in the kitchen every evening, overnight. If your phone is found upstairs, first time you lose it for 48 hours. Second time, a week. Third time a month. None of the children have ever lost it for more than 48 hours. Although the youngest may still...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Apple ID to the phone is mine, nothing can be downloaded without me entering a password. Also no phones upstairs. Ever. They are left in the kitchen every evening, overnight. If your phone is found upstairs, first time you lose it for 48 hours. Second time, a week. Third time a month. None of the children have ever lost it for more than 48 hours. Although the youngest may still...

This is basically us, although all I really care about is that the phone charges overnight downstairs, not that it never go upstairs.

Around 16 I stopped checking his phone.

[Anonymous]

15 yr old DS - We have the downstairs at night rule, screen time limits to 2 hrs a day on school days, screentime is off 9:30-6:30 during week, 10:30-8:30 on weekends unless he’s out or at sleepover. We also use life 360 and can view his texts from our home computer, full access to phone. We do not however check it unless there is a strong reason to, we never look at snap. We have seen a couple of questionable texts and these have led to good talks and life lessons. He doesn’t like it but with time trust and reason we will continue to ease up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Apple ID to the phone is mine, nothing can be downloaded without me entering a password. Also no phones upstairs. Ever. They are left in the kitchen every evening, overnight. If your phone is found upstairs, first time you lose it for 48 hours. Second time, a week. Third time a month. None of the children have ever lost it for more than 48 hours. Although the youngest may still...

This is basically us, although all I really care about is that the phone charges overnight downstairs, not that it never go upstairs.

Around 16 I stopped checking his phone.

When you say it's yours, you mean you use yours for his phone (do you also have a phone and is that a problem?), or you established a new one also connected to your email so everything goes through you? Sorry, treat me like I'm 5 on this stuff. Not OP, but we're heading down the phone road soon, and I'm trying to figure out what makes sense.

[Anonymous]

No rules after he entered Junior year of HS.

[Anonymous]

We have the same rules as the others posted in addition to locking it down with screentime (ios) and ourpact. That way I dont even need to take the phone away, I can lock it down remotely.

[Anonymous]

Fortunately we live really close to his school, because he’s no longer allowed to bring his phone with him. Apparently not all teachers have firm rules about no phones in the classroom; this was shocking to me. He was using the phone during class, so now has to leave it at home.

Once home, he has to do his homework before having access to electronics. When we have to come down hard on him for whatever reason he surrenders electronics altogether for a week or so, aside from school laptop use for homework, at a kitchen desk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No rules after he entered Junior year of HS.

Not even 'For external use only' or 'Not for human consumption' ?

[Anonymous]

We have no rules for our 15 year old son. Just content restrictions that limits his searching on Safari and google to exclude explicit content. I can’t even remember how I set that up back when he was 12, but I know it’s still on because he occasionally complains about not being able to see certain websites and we have to mark them as viewable. All our family members use out phones as alarm clocks in the morning so we all take our phones upstairs. We don’t have problems with the kids being on their phones at odd hours. They all want their sleep.

[Anonymous]

Phone charges downstairs at night but he can bring upstairs to his room other times

It gets taken away for misuse (happens occaisonally) or we take it away for behavior unrelated to phone since he cares a lot about.

I spot check the texts -- one or two issues which I pointed out

I also have a senior in high school --- I have stopped caring if he brings his phone in his room - he will be off at college soon and it's kind of up to him. I also never check his texts anymore - he has a girlfriend and I'm fine with him having privacy.

[Anonymous]

Those of you with teenagers who aren't allowed to take the phones up - how do you prevent it? And how do they play music in their rooms?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those of you with teenagers who aren't allowed to take the phones up - how do you prevent it? And how do they play music in their rooms?

NP. My 15 YO DS is required to turn in his phone to me every weeknight by 9;00. I’m responsible for overnight battery charging. He studies snd plays music downstairs from his laptop. I do random checks on his texts, mostly checking for bad language. He loses the phone for a day for inappropriate language

[Anonymous]

Our only rule is that he has to get off the phone when we tell him to. Other than that, he can take his phone upstairs or wherever whatever.

He is a good kid with great grades, etc so we trust him with his phone. His school allows phones and laptops, watch, etc which does not cause DS any problems.