The boys found the classic “Owl Babies” on the bookshelf. It’s the story of three baby owls waiting for their mother to come home. Looking through it, Daniel said “They’re like us; an older girl, a middle boy and a younger boy.” They looked nostalgically at the illustrations for a while, then Michael piped up, “Not really, because the eldest owl isn’t playing on her mobile phone.”
The Princess got a phone as an early Christmas present from her uncle and aunt and we have not determined what the rules are about usage and into this vacuum has seeped 24 hour usage by herself and an ocean of bitterness on the part of her brothers. Not our finest parenting hour, something will have to be done. Sigh.
Suggest that it is bad manners at the dining table or when relatives are present. If you would not be reading a book, which is civilised, you should not be on the phone. Or suggest a 1960s cure, you can only play on the phone when it is plugged into the wall in the hall. Not unreasonable to an adult but awful to a teenager. There is an nternal logic to this, in that communicating with people or things which are not present, is very bad manners to the people in front of you.
Yes I am not helpful but I keep my phone in my rucksack in the car so I do not play with it and I only use hands free to talk. Not holier than thou, just someone who learned the hard way thT things can go,pear shaped quite quickly…
You open an appalling vista; I can reassure you that mealtimes, at least, are electronic device free. The problem is the boys get 20 minutes computer time a day. They use it to watch endless videos of American teenagers talking about role playing games. Herself is not so restricted but she uses the phone to do educational things like watch ted talks and do quizzes; I mean that’s not all she uses it for but a lot of it is that. So it’s not quite comparing like with like. But yet, I sense that a restriction would be no harm…