Reply to Please don't give your elementary school child a smart phone

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Reply to "Please don't give your elementary school child a smart phone"

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[quote=Anonymous]I think that's a pretty personal decision. What works for one family/kid is that parent's business. I don't think you, I, or anyone else has any business telling another parent what to buy for their kid.

My kid got a hand me down smartphone when we decided she was old enough to have her own email account and access to the online family calendar. She was 8. I put kajeet parental controls on the phone, so it will be pretty heavily locked down until at least late middle school.

Overkill? Possibly, but we would require her to have a basic phone anyway to keep in touch with us about her pick up situation, and we  like that the smartphone gives her both email and calendar access at any time since we're specifically working with her on time management and organization. If we hadn't given her the phone now we would have by 5th grade when she started taking city buses and metro on her own -- I would want her to have access to the google maps feature and metro's/the city's trip planner website to check for timing and outages. I wouldn't consider it appropriate or safe for her to travel on her own without that safety net in case something went wrong; even I do not like to do so as an adult with many years of experience navigating via public transit.

Obviously I would not condone my child badgering yours about not having a phone, and it would be wrong for anyone to interfere in your decision regarding whether or when you deem it appropriate for your child to have access to such technology, but on the flip side I do not tend to make decisions for my kids based on what other families find appropriate for theirs.[/quote]

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