{"id":233,"date":"2023-04-25T21:01:25","date_gmt":"2023-04-25T21:01:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/?p=233"},"modified":"2023-04-25T21:01:26","modified_gmt":"2023-04-25T21:01:26","slug":"your-childs-first-phone-are-they-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/2023\/04\/25\/your-childs-first-phone-are-they-ready\/","title":{"rendered":"Your Child\u2019s First Phone: Are They Ready?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Deciding when you can give your child their first phone and also allow them to have access to the internet, social media and apps can be a source of anxiety. You may not feel your child is ready for that much access to the digital world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Below are some things to ask and consider as you and your child discuss getting a first phone:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  1. Has your child thought through how they would want to use the phone?<\/strong> It’s natural for kids and teens to want a phone because peer pressure or fomo. However, they may not be ready for problems that can come with having a phone. Talk with your child about other options that allows communication without all the digital baggage.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Know you child\u2019s strength and weaknesses.<\/strong> Does your child have a strong sense of responsibility or is he\/she impulsive? Can they make good decisions unsupervised?, This becomes important to consider once they have access to the internet, texting and social media apps and can easily say or post things they may regret.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Talk with your child about online safety and good digital citizenship. <\/strong>Decide on some benchmarks that would show that they are being safe and kind while using their new technology. Monitor what they watch, post and their interactions online.Teach them to be kind, considerate and empathetic online and everywhere.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Teach your child about other ways to connect with friends.<\/strong> Social connection is the biggest driver for having a phone in the tween and teen years. Interacting with friends is crucial tant as your child develops a sense of self and community. However, if you don’t think your child is ready for a smartphone, there are other ways to help them connect with friends eg joining sports or clubs at school.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Check in with them about how life is going including their digital life. <\/strong>Create a space were your child is free to discuss with you their online experesences be it positive or negative. Because the digital world isn’t always designed with young users in mind, though, your child or teen needs you to act as a mentor. In this role, you can help them have positive experiences online and unpack the negative experiences.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Deciding when you can give your child their first phone and also allow them to have access to the internet, social media and apps can be a source of anxiety. You may not feel your child is ready for that much access to the digital world. Below are some things to ask and consider as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":207,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":234,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233\/revisions\/234"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/safespace.co.zw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}