My poor Iphone-less 13 year old

[Desnik]

Stirring the pot here, but why does a 12 year old need a cellphone, much less an iphone?

There are lots of reasons, but I'll just give you mine.

My 9yo has an iPhone. He has it because he had a cell phone and an iPod. It was a pain for him to carry around both when we went places. So that was one reason we got him the iPhone, actually he got DH's iPhone 4S when my DH upgraded to the iPhone5. He uses it more like he did the iPod, it's just a bonus that it's a phone too. He has grandparents that live far away and he loves texting with them on his phone. I like him to have the phone when we go places like the mall. God forbid he gets lost, I have a way to locate/contact him. I must add that we are technology junkies and we are an Apple crazy family.

My DD is turning 15 in a few weeks and she has had an iPhone 4 for awhile and got the iPhone5 for Xmas this year. For her, having a phone is a must. She stays after school a lot and she'll text/call me so I know when to get her. If we are in a store and she wants to go to another section I love that I can contact her. She has unlimited texting so she uses that with her friends. If she is at a friends house I love thatI can contact her directly when needed. Also, she has her own music website and on her phone she can post all her updates. She needs the access to Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook for her news updates she does for other music fans. Also, in her school, some of her teachers let the kids use their phones for research, calculators, and even music. For example, her English teacher lets them listen to music on their phones when they are doing creative writing.

Out of all my DD's friends they all have a smart phone. In my DS's group of friends he is the only one who has one.

 

[DawnM]

My 13 year old does have an iphone, but it is more of an ipod touch. I have a Spot Mobile SIM card in it that allows .05 texting and .10/min. calls. Internet capability is ONLY in wifi.

I pay about $5-$10 every 90 days for his plan.

But he really should have an ipod touch instead. He refuses to take his iphone with him anywhere but home and the car because he is afraid it will get stolen or he will lose it.

That doesn't really bother me, we have another flip phone he can take and have Spot Mobile on that we don't care about that he can take when he needs a phone to call me to pick him up.

Dawn

 

[castleview]

Stirring the pot here, but why does a 12 year old need a cellphone, much less an iphone?

It's mostly a comfort zone convenience, but we got her one when she started middle school. We actually gave it to her for her fifth grade "graduation" so she could play with it over the summer and get over the novelty of it. Her's calls, texts, and takes pictures. It costs $10 a month to have her on our plan and she got the free phone that came with signing her up. We are in a regionalized school system and her school is in another town. She's active in sports and various after school programs. So it makes it easier if she's carpooling and I have to meet the other mom somewhere or I'm not sure what part of the building or field to pick her up in. Heck, I can't tell you how many times after a basketball game, she has had to run to the locker room and I've had to text her to get moving, I'll be in the parking lot.

I also have to admit that it's nice if she forgets something regarding her homework that she can just text a friend to find out what work they have to do. Just the other day a friend brought home the wrong math book and DD sent her a picture of the pages they had to do. We are fortunate though that their school does not allow phone usage or carrying during the day. They are only allowed to use it on the bus.

I'm also fortunate that she's in a good group at school. Overall, the entire grade that she's in has many kids whose parents are not the "rushing" type when it comes to this stuff. DD#2 though…I'm in for it. She's only in fifth grade and several of her classmates have had Iphones, regular cell phones, Facebook and Instagram accounts for a few years now. I've already been down the "I don't care what they have…" road with her many times.

 

[Duchie]

It's not so much the cost of the phone but the monthly costs for having them that drive me crazy. With 5 of us our bill is already outrageous (IMO). To add a smart phone, there's a $10/month charge for each one, and that's on top of the extra to add the data plan. That would be at least $50/month right there, and I think that's just insane. So if they want smart phones, they can get a job and pay for them. Until then, they can be happy with what they have.

 

[mamamary]

It's not so much the cost of the phone but the monthly costs for having them that drive me crazy. With 5 of us our bill is already outrageous (IMO). To add a smart phone, there's a $10/month charge for each one, and that's on top of the extra to add the data plan. That would be at least $50/month right there, and I think that's just insane. So if they want smart phones, they can get a job and pay for them. Until then, they can be happy with what they have.

We were going to upgrade my dd's phone for Christmas to an iphone until we found out it would be an additional $50 per month. I found that to be outrageous. She's got a new phone but not an iphone. I will say though that most of her friends do have iphones but i just could not swing an extra $50 per month.

 

[luvsJack]

The one thing dd never says she wants is an I-anything. She has a Samsung Galaxy--it was free and is happy with that.

I guess our provider is different than most. Our Smartphone plans are no higher than the other plans. Dh still has a flip phone and his plan is actually a little higher than mine and dd's. (she and I have a share plan).

So, since her phone was free (as has almost every phone she has had) and the plan isn't really higher, I never saw a reason not to get her the phone she wanted.

 

[JVL1018]

My kids don't have iPhones. They have regular cellphones that they got when they turned 10(for MY convenience, not theirs-I want to be able to get in touch with them, and that was the age where they were staring to go off on their own around the neighborhood).

Anyway, I am not opposed to iPhones in general, I am opposed to paying $75 a month for my kids cell phone..but now I'm wondering if it is that much-how much are additional iPhones on a family plan for AT&T?

Right now, my husband and I pay like $75(I think) each for our iphones with unlimited text and data and $10 each for the kids cells with unlimited text.
I'm not sure what our talk minutes are since we hardly ever use them for that, even if we were limited, we'd never go over.

 

[ckay87]

I love technology, but I really love my money. I just can't justify any kind of smartphone (plan) for MYSELF, let alone for my poor, abused 16 year old. I keep telling him, much to his dismay, that we simply will not die if we can't access the internet for a few hours here and there. I mean, they sure are neat and I'd love to have one, but you know what's even neater? Groceries. Vacations. Cars.

 

[CdnCarrie]

I had to laugh when I read this. My kids, 15 and 17, just got the 4 and so did their parents. I only opt for the free phones, so we jumped to smart phones using the oldest technology out there. My 17 year old still had a flip phone, so he was happy!

My husband got his first smartphone last night and it was a iPhone 4. I'm replacing my basic crappy android with the 4. Not everyone can afford the newest models!

 

[bunny]

I love technology, but I really love my money. I just can't justify any kind of smartphone (plan) for MYSELF, let alone for my poor, abused 16 year old. I keep telling him, much to his dismay, that we simply will not die if we can't access the internet for a few hours here and there. I mean, they sure are neat and I'd love to have one, but you know what's even neater? Groceries. Vacations. Cars.

I totally agree. Our neighbor girl has an i-phone as do all of her siblings. She told me their family plan is over $400 a month. Two of her older siblings are in college. She was shocked when I told her I plan to pay for my teen to go to college. Her brother will graduate from Penn State owing over $100,000. Some people's priorities are wack.

 

[robinb]

LOL! My own 13-year old has also been BEGGING for an iPhone. I bought her an iPad Mini for Hanukkah (she contributed $200 for it) and she has a 4th generation ipod touch from last year but that doesn't seem to matter. Poor, poor, abused and unloved child.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Not everyone pays $50/month. With a corporate discount, our 2GB data plan is $19/month. My kids chose to have that instead of an allowance. We'd have the family texting plan whether we had smart phones or not. For us, it's money well spent since we all use our iPhones in lots of ways and they've made our lives more convenient. It was a beautiful thing seeng my kids face time their sick grandmother when she was in the hospital on nights they couldn't physically be there.

I don't really get the disdain about it. I've noticed that many people who previously dished the iPhones all have them now. One of my family members was a hold-out still using a pay as you go flip phone. We got him an iPod for XMas, knowing he'd really enjoy it as he'd played around with some of our stuff. Once he started figuring it all out, he was like, "It doesn't make sense to have this and a phone, and be tied just to a wireless network", so we returned it and he's getting an iPhone. Interestingly enough, the thing he liked best was the GPS.

 

[BellePrincessBelle]

I've got to say, I don't know more than a handful of highschoolers that don't have iphones. My kids all have them.

 

[NotUrsula]

No way that my kid gets a fancier phone than I have, and we simply do not do contracts for phone service -- we are WAY too frugal for that. I have the only smartphone in the family because I am required to have one for work; it's an Android and I pay $25/mo for unlimited data and texts, and more minutes than I could ever possibly use are included.
Our total expense for 3 wireless phone accounts is $460/yr.

I don't care much for Apple products anyway, but DS does like them. However, he has no interest in an iPhone. He has an iPod and is lusting after a wifi iPad, but the phone doesn't interest him at all. Right now he has a basic flip phone; it is a prepaid with rollover credit for calls and texts, and he uses it so little that he is carrying a balance of over $300.

WiFi is so ubiquitous where we live that he really doesn't feel that he needs a phone much; he often forgets that he has it at all.

 

[okeydokey]

My kid can get a phone when my kid can pay for the phone and the plan. End of story. I had to wait for hours as a kid when after school got cancelled or my mom was late. I lived to tell the tale.

Wow. I would never want my kid to wait for me for hours for a ride. They would need to have regular jobs to pay for a phone plan. What is that, 16 or 17 if you are lucky enough to get a job?

 

[KimR]

My older 2 both have i-phones and my youngest (11) just this week got a regular cell phone. She didn't really want one as she uses the ipad to text and face-time with her friends and so didn't really see the need for the phone, but DH wanted her to have one. If/when she wants to upgrade to an iphone, we will get her one.

I still don't have an iphone and doubt I ever will. I rarely use my cell phone and I prefer my ipad for accessing the internet when I'm away from home. I don't like the tiny screens on the iphone, so I imagine eventually I'll be the only i-phoneless one in the family. Poor, deprived me.

 

[eliza61]

No iPhones for anyone in my family.
Not paying the charges for it.

 

[KennesawNemo]

So DD13 was telling me how ALL the kids in school got Iphones for Christmas. Funny how all constitutes five or six kids while the other 200 students go unnoticed. I said "maybe one day, but you have all you need on your phone (calling & texting) and you have your IPOD". Well, I forgot that the IPOD is only the 4th generation.

So as the bus comes, she said "I'm not even going to ask for a new car when I'm old enough because I'll be lucky to drive a hubcap to school." Well, okay&at least she knows to keep her expectations low.

I am 35, working, making reasonable income. So is DH.

We don't have smart phones. We use pre-paid dinosaur ages phones. We are doing fine.

Also, DS 7's expectatoins are we would buy him an Ipad once he turns 13 and buy him a Halo game once he turns 18, but he has to play the Halo on his Wii. No X-BoX if he wants Halo. -- I guess at this age, he is still easy to fool. LoL

 

[Gumbo4x4]

So DD13 was telling me how ALL the kids in school got Iphones for Christmas. Funny how all constitutes five or six kids while the other 200 students go unnoticed. I said "maybe one day, but you have all you need on your phone (calling & texting) and you have your IPOD". Well, I forgot that the IPOD is only the 4th generation.

So as the bus comes, she said "I'm not even going to ask for a new car when I'm old enough because I'll be lucky to drive a hubcap to school." Well, okay…at least she knows to keep her expectations low.

We got DD12 an Iphone 4S for Christmas, her first phone. But, we're on data-share with my parents & it only added $35 a month to our bill. Couldn't do that with a free flip phone. We debated getting her the 4 since it was free, but (A) we were in need of a big-ticket item to balance out DD7's gifts, and (B) wife & I both have a 4S and figure DD12 will show us how to use them

 

[goofyintoronto]

Stirring the pot here, but why does a 12 year old need a cellphone, much less an iphone?

My son got his first phone at the age of 9. My reason? .... I was sick and tired of going thru my ex-husband to talk to my son. He'd always be rushing him off the phone, saying he's expecting an important call from a client. Got fed up and bought him his own phone. Thats my reason.

His first was a flip phone. Second phone was a blackberry (no data - just facebook), now he has an iphone 4. He loves it! Im anti-iphone & pro-android, so we argue quite often as to who has the better phone. LOL!