Talk to me about the pre-teen club

[Tink113]

I noticed that they can check themselves in and out if the club. My son is 12 (almost 13) and I’m not keen on him roaming the ship by himself.

What do I need to know about the tween club?? Did you kids like it? Did they stay there a lot?

 

[Geomom]

It's true that for Edge and Vibe the kids can come and go on their own. You'll need to talk with your son in advance as to your expectations for where he can go when he leaves the club. Does he need to go straight back to the room? Meet up with you somewhere, etc? Send you a chat message? Etc. What are the consequences if he doesn't follow your rules?

Some activities have the kids doing things around the ship in teams as well as activities in the club. I only had an Edge (and a Vibe) age kid in 2016 on the Wonder and a Vibe age kid on the Magic in 2018, so I can't answer any specifics about the Fantasy.

 

[anricat]

My daughter had a lot of fun in Edge when she was in that age group. She liked it so much better than the younger age club. Make sure he goes the first day because that's when they do a lot of the ice breaker type get-to-know-you games.

My daughter always had to have her phone with her. If she was leaving Edge, she had to tell us where she was going immediately. She was allowed to be out and about on her own, but she couldn't just be roaming the ship. She needed to have a destination like "I'm going to get ice cream with my new friend." She was not allowed into anyone else's cabin and no-one was to go with her into our cabin. And yes, a couple of times we did check that she really was getting ice cream or shopping or standing in line for Goofy or whatever it was she said she was going to do when leaving Edge.

They have a lot of great activities in there and then also just chill time to play games, do whatever choice of crafts they might like, etc.

 

[princesscinderella]

They play a scavenger hunt type game around the ship in edge and vibe that lasts the cruise so they do activities outside of the designated club area. We let our kids go around the ship at 12 as long as they sent us texts through the app of where they were going to be. We also set a curfew to return, which my youngest tested on day one of the cruise and we had to go find her because she wasn’t paying attention to the time and we located her hanging out in a big porthole on deck 3 with some club friends. After that she had to check in with a text every hour on the hour to let us know where she was at, she set a timer on her phone and did it diligently the rest of the cruise. It taught her time management and she said it made her more aware. Kids need the freedom to grow and explore and make decisions on their own at that age as they are quickly turning into adults with bigger choices and responsibilities. The freedom with limits we gave her on the cruise after all the covid lack of socialization was huge for her she was a different kid after that week on the fantasy, confident in making friends and being able to make her own choices.

 

[CamColt]

I'm not sure if they had the Edge when my oldest was a tween, but I remember my youngest loving it! I think the freedom was a big part of it but also just hanging out and enjoying the cruise with other kids. We barely saw him and had to force him to come to dinner with us each night. Once we spotted him with a bunch of kids doing a scavenger hunt and you could tell he was having a blast.

As others have said, just set up rules with him in advance, times to check in, or have him contact you when he leaves the club...whatever you are comfortable with. I guess now you can probably chat with him, but in our day the kids would leave notes in the room ("left the edge, went to get ice cream").