Cell Phones and 7 Year Olds
Cell phones being ever so popular and very rare that you ever find someone that does not have one on them more and more younger kids are toting them around now too. When is a child too young to be carrying around a cell phone? Is it really appropriate for 6 to 10 year olds to be on the family cell phone plan?
On a belated Christmas dinner get together the other night with family I got a chance to visit with people that I hadn't seen in quite some time. One of which was my 7 year old cousin. Out of her pocket she pulls out a chunky pink cell phone and starts playing sound clips. At first I thought that it was just simply a toy and dismissed it. When she came to sit down next to me I noticed the Verizon logo on the phone. I asked my aunt if it was a "real" phone and for some reason was shocked when told yes. Her phone was set up with full text, multimedia, email capabilities and web browsing. Is it just me or is this a bit overboard?
I may just be an over protective mother that might like staying in the shadows when it comes to my child and the waves of technology, but I'm just not comfortable with the idea of my youngster having the world wide web and telephone in their pocket where ever they go at all hours of the day. At the age of 5, my daughter still isn't even allowed to answer the home phone.
All that runs through my mind is what was her mother thinking? We are all concerned about internet safety with our children. We have all seen different cases not only having to do with Internet sites like MySpace and Facebook, but with cell phones as well when it comes to picture messaging. I recently wrote an article for parentingreport.com about a school that is now offering classes for parents as a result of a picture message that got sent around of a nude 14 year old. The girl took the picture herself and sent it to a couple people. From there it was sent to hundreds of kids and adults alike.
Am I really alone on this one? What are your opinions on kids and cell phones? What do you think is a good age to allow your kids the freedom of having their own phone? I know that there are a lot of different plans that you can get to monitor them and what they are doing on the phone as well as when, but it only takes one time to take a photo and send it off. Once it's out there, you can never get it back especially if it's on the internet. At least when we were kids, if we screwed up we had a chance at it being forgotten over time. Now all it takes is someone to hit the send button and it will last forever for the whole world to see.
