Monmouthshire is poised to write a new chapter. If it passes, it will make it the first county in the UK to recommend parents refrain from giving their kids smartphones until age 14. This program comes as a result of increased concerns with cyberbullying. It further outlines some of the negative impacts caused by overuse of smartphones on children’s academics and mental health.
Monmouth Comprehensive School is the driving force behind this initiative. Executive headteacher Hugo Hutchinson has noticed some scary aspects of how students use smartphones. He has seen students typically spending six to eight hours logged on after school. Many remain engaged on their devices well past a normal bedtime, at two, three, or even four o’clock in the morning. Hutchinson drove home the point that this is not just a school district problem, but rather an issue that pervades the whole community.
“This is not a school issue. This is a whole community and society issue,” Hutchinson stated. He expanded on the mental health effects. As a result, like all schools across the country, we are experiencing significantly increased levels of mental health challenges, he said. Addiction to smartphones, addiction to being online.”
One of the students caught up in this trend Lili, 11, is a student at Monmouth Comprehensive. Her class is one of the first to be hit by the new policy, which prohibits more than six unrelated students. This is one of the reasons that Lili thinks that kids (herself included) are given smartphones at too young an age. She explained, “I just feel like 14-15 isn’t realistic.” Her statement echoes a new reality among youth and teens, as the unintended consequences of smartphone ownership start to rear their ugly heads.
Morgan, one of Lili’s classmates, similarly recounted his own addiction to smartphones. While he used to own one, he decided to stop using it after learning more about its negative impacts in school. Morgan’s observation that some of his friends have their heads buried in their phones at all times. He added, “Their staff are just 100% always just on it!” So when children go over to play at other family homes, they simply go on their cell phones and just text.
This recent move to ban smartphone access for kids under 13 has attracted praise from a surprising cast of characters. Emma is an engaged and active parent. She leads by example and takes efforts to limit her smartphone use so she doesn’t set a bad example for her kids. Violet told us that her 12-year-old son, Monty, does not have a smartphone. Instead, he mostly plays games on her computer. Emma admitted her initial concerns about Monty feeling excluded from his peers: “I was worried my son would feel left out.”
On the opposite end of the parenting spectrum was Nicholas Dorkings, who looked back on his own tech usage as a parent. We found out that the first time he let his son have a smartphone was at eight years old. Dorkings added, “He’s never really been off one. Perhaps more than any other, this quote captures the frenetic arms race many of today’s parents have been pressured into joining to equip their children with cutting-edge technology.
The initiative has been widely heralded by children’s advocates too. The current children’s commissioner for England has called on headteachers to be given the final say over whether smartphones are permitted. He believes decisions should not be mandated down at the county level. Responding MPs agreed that banning phones should be up to individual head teachers. Additionally, parents have “the real power,” as the commissioner put it, to decide how their kids use technology.
Monmouth Comprehensive School’s plans to address all the recommendations. They recommend parents consider alternative communication devices to smartphones for their children, such as “brick phones,” for use during school commutes. This is a much-needed lifeline for children to remain in contact. It protects their eyes from the blue light and their minds from the distractions and dangers posed by modern smartphones.
As this discussion unfolds in Monmouthshire, educators and parents alike are grappling with how best to balance technology use with children’s developmental needs. In general, most people understand that although smartphones have the potential to be good, they can certainly be bad and thus need to be approached cautiously.
