New phone for my 12 y.o. daughter - tips?

[jorian]

My daughter is getting her first phone. We are Apple people so that what she is getting. My question is more to do with rules/dos & don'ts.

She is pretty savvy about social media and not posting something that will bite her later but I want to avoid issues by setting the rules early rather than when something happens.

Thanks.

[scottmandue]

Don't want to be Debbie Downer and I totally get that it is a safety issue i.e all young ladies should have a cell phone in case of an emergency.

However I also just read an article that basically said "once you hand a child a smart phone it is game over".

I think what they meant is no matter how much you try to track, control, monitor there is usually a techy work around...

Take that with a grain of salt because I don't have kids so don't have any experience attempting to control cell phone usage.

Edit to add, same article claimed cell phones are as addictive as drugs... may sound far fetched but take a look around... like the guy I was following into work this morning in a new Audi, swerving around like a drunken sailor... no doubt checking his email or GPS.

[carambola]

get enough data

[stomachmonkey]

Use the family sharing and restrictions offerings.

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201304

[Dantilla]

The phone is your electronic leash.

She must understand that it is YOUR phone, since you are paying for it. As such, you may have it at any time, and scroll through anything and everything.

My daughter got a phone at 14, and she knew it was for MY convenience, not hers.

[PetrolBlueSC]

Have a contract with expectations. These might include turn in times, grades, etc. Also have outcomes for when expectations are not met. Phone can be randomly inspected at any time. Phone can be lost for certain types of use, like sexting. If permanent lost occurs, the next phone they own, will be the one they buy themselves.

[berettafan]

Girls in particular abuse the **** out of each other via text and social media.

[aigel]

No smartphone before age 16 at my house. Should consider dragging it out at least another couple years. I am not popular for pushing this rule, but it isn't my job to be popular ...

G

[LEAKYSEALS951]

[reachme]

I have three daughters and here is what I do.

1. Your daughter must have a passcode on the phone and share that with you. Block others, include you.
2. Have her use your apple ID. Every song/movie she downloads will come to you, as will the bill that she can pay you for if you are a good Dad.
3. Nationalize all power cords to the kitchen. Phone must stay down every night after dinner for charging. I have a 6USB charger box with a bunch of Apple charger cables in it. No reason for a teenager to text from their bedroom at night.
4. Email her monthly the data report showing how much bandwidth she used so she is aware. Teach her the difference between Wifi, cell data, roaming, tethering etc.
5. Let her know you may check her phone, at first she will be fine with that. Later she will challenge you and say "you don't trust me"!. Be clear that you do not trust her (cause you don't) and say that teenagers are known to make bad decisions but that's ok because they have parents.
6. Have iTunes on a central family computer with the library in a shared directory (setup a new user acct and give everyone access to their documents dir). State the reason so you can share music and not buy twice. They will soon see that everything they purchase will be shared.
7. Absolutely NO taking pictures of others in the house to share without their approval. Incriminating pictures are way too easy to instantly share across the world and use as leverage against sisters. If suspected they must turn over their phone for inspection by the other (sister) who gets to scroll through their pictures to verify [which they absolutely HATE].
They must friend you on facebook or instagram, twitter, snapchat, chatroulette or whatever they want to join. If you don't know then look at the apps they have.

Later they will start to delete texts that are personal. I'm fine with that but they cannot stop texts that come in after they leave the phone in the kitchen and they come up on the screen. Like the Chinese media they will self police which is what you want. They can have their own life with private things but digital is not the place to air it.

I have witnessed numerous incidents of group bullying. inappropriate texts, etc. and knowing this will be public data I get a very mature reaction from them. Exactly what you would want. The way I see it is the internet is like New York City. You can go to the peepshows or you can go to the art museums and if you accompany them they will be more comfortable at museums. The internet is the same way.

Oh and when they are on the shared family computer, SSH into it from your iphone downstairs, use SAY command to tell them "It's Dad,,, I am shutting off the computer now,, it's time to come down to dinner".
Try shutdown g0 -y now and they will assume you can see and do ANYTHING.

[aigel]

IMHO, early teen age girls + smartphone are bad news. Let some of those hormones settle in a little before you take that step. If the girl is 12, you may not have seen what's going to happen soon ...

G

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by reachme

2. Have her use your apple ID. Every song/movie she downloads will come to you, as will the bill that she can pay you for if you are a good Dad.

You should look into family sharing https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201088 and managing kids accounts with it https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201084

This is useful for them to be able to install apps when you are not there to sign in for them.

My kids schools regularly download apps for use in STEM classes.

Kind of pointless to limit them to my account if they have the password.

[JavaBrewer]

Originally Posted by carambola

get enough data

Just spring for the unlimited data plan now. You will be money ahead in 6 months.

[reachme]

Originally Posted by stomachmonkey

Kind of pointless to limit them to my account if they have the password.

Of course they have the shared iTunes acct password. I have nothing to hide why should they-it's a good message. My phone is paid for by work and you can sure bet they monitor what I do. In a few years colleges and employers will be searching her history.

Anyway the email address it sends transaction history to is mine so I see what they order. And we both get each others stuff so yes I have all Taylor Swifts songs on my phone automatically. They get The Eagles and Rush and I can live with that. You can set to not auto add new content but that is exactly what I want.

[Dantilla]

Originally Posted by reachme

3. Nationalize all power cords to the kitchen.

+1.

Our rule was the phone had to be on the little half-height wall between the nook and family room every night. Can't have the phone in the bedroom.

This way, she's not staying up late playing on the phone, and the half wall is close to our bedroom, far away from hers. Easy to scroll through and see what she's been up to after she goes to bed.

[varmint]

probably obvious

the find my iPhone app.

[Cajundaddy]

I guess I am out of the loop. My girls got phones when they got a driver's license and they were on loan (owned by parents). It was a while ago and there were no data plans, just talkies. Our phones had a curfew and were handed over to parents after 10pm. No late night chatting from the bedroom.

12-15 is a delicate age for girls where their hormones are raging and they are completely fascinated with boys and relationships. This fascination also blinds them to potential dangers out in Pandora's box, AKA the internet. One of my daughters could have been a stalker at 13.

My only advice is to stay in control of the phone use and err on the side of caution.

[rattlsnak]

Get this...

TeenSafe Phone Tracker: Cell Phone Monitoring & Tracking for Android & Iphone

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by reachme

Of course they have the shared iTunes acct password. I have nothing to hide why should they-it's a good message. My phone is paid for by work and you can sure bet they monitor what I do. In a few years colleges and employers will be searching her history.

Anyway the email address it sends transaction history to is mine so I see what they order. And we both get each others stuff so yes I have all Taylor Swifts songs on my phone automatically. They get The Eagles and Rush and I can live with that. You can set to not auto add new content but that is exactly what I want.

If the account is shared then even more reason to let them have their own accounts and manage it using the family tools.

[onewhippedpuppy]

My 12 year old son just got a phone for his birthday. He is active in sports so always being dropped off at practices, and is our primary babysitter and we don't have a home phone. Our rules:

We get the password and can check his phone at any time
Grade under B = no phone until it comes up
Phone is plugged in each night in our room with our phones
No social media BS
Nothing that can incriminate you - we've had multiple talks about how digital is forever, and the school/legal consequences that can result
Phone is a privilege that can be revoked at any time