"Like most teenagers, my daughter triple-checks that she has her phone before she leaves for school each morning. It's her lifeline to friends and a necessary tool for letting me know when she will be home after cross-country practice or checking the schedule for the public bus that gets to and from school."
"At the age of 8, she started walking to school on her own, and I wanted her to have a phone so she could call me if she got lost or found herself in trouble."
"My daughter is now 15, and I don't regret giving her a phone so early. It helped her gain independence and confidence, and allowed me to guide her through the pitfalls of having a phone while she was still young enough to listen to me and care about what I thought. Nevertheless, I don't believe phones have a place in schools. When I heard that our local school district implemented a bell-to-bell ban on phones during the school day, and that my daughter's charter school had decided to follow suit, I was thrilled. My daughter did not share my enthusiasm, but she was forced to accept the inevitable."
The daughter began walking to school alone at age eight and received a cellphone for safety and communication. The phone served as a lifeline to friends, a way to confirm arrival, coordinate after-practice pickup, and check bus schedules. The parent does not regret giving a phone early because it fostered independence and allowed parental guidance through smartphone pitfalls. The parent supports a bell-to-bell school phone ban, aligning with teachers' calls for bans. Some studies indicate phone bans improve focus, social connections, health, and school safety, and those findings match the daughter's experiences.
Read at Business Insider
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