Should Your Toddler Use The Phone?

Hi All,

Should your toddler use the phone? I have been questioning the same thing for several days now. I got the inspiration from watching a talk show, where a single mother suddenly collapsed in the night. The child tried to make an emergency call, but she was unable to read the numbers, so she ran in the night asking for help. Fortunately the ending of the story ended well.

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But wouldn’t it be nice if we can give toddlers the ability to make phone calls, perhaps to their family members? I am thinking of putting a picture based interface, where the child can just click on a list of pictures/photos, and the phone/tablet will automatically connects to the person. The strange thing is, most parents I talked to find it unnecessary for the following reasons. Do you agree?

My child is never alone, there is always someone supervising
There is always at least a grandparent, a nanny or a maid attending to the child. But what if something happened to the caregiver? Wouldn’t you want your child to make an emergency call rather than running around in the streets? Streets are not always safe.

Keep calm and call mommy and daddy

What if the child makes excessive phone calls?
Some mothers are just worried their child will keep calling them or some other people (Santa perhaps?) to the point of annoying people. Well the app I had in mind will only allow them to call a list of people which you selected.And I think this should only be a matter of discipline. Telling your kid only to call you when it is necessary or urgent. Besides if you are worried about the bill, you can also limit the usage by either using a pre paid card, or using a certain phone plan which limits the data and phone usage.

Santa phone

Tablets and phones emit radiation
Yes they do, although the the researches are still inconclusive. I recommend limiting the child’s exposure to the phone or tablet. We can do this by creating an app with a parental control where by the child can only use the phone for let say 30 minutes or one hour if the child calls for an emergency. Here are some other articles which I found useful about phone radiations.

He is too young
Some parents are saying toddlers are too young to understand the phone’s functionality. But that is the reason I’m even thinking about the app.

Isn’t there already something free in the web for this?
Well I have searched the web, there is no FREE app for this, although there are some vendors selling a similar app. But from what I see, they are either selling a special kind of phone, or the app is only sold in the US, because it is tied to the phone provider,

And based on multiple parenting forums I encounter, it appears parents are more concern in putting parental control when their children are online.

Regards
Aireen Deviani


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