![\"Buying](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/p-content\/themes\/atahualpa342\/images\/articles\/2015\/11\/Buying-your-Tweens-First-Phone-main.jpg?ssl=1\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThis is the second article in our series on parental advice for tweens and teens and their phones. This first article, Parental Advice Before Giving Your Child a Phone<\/a>, published last week.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The time has come. Your child is no longer interested in dolls, Barbies, race cars, or Pogo sticks. Now, s\/he is asking for her\/his first phone. Raising your child is about to get a bit more expensive. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Giving your child their first phone is beneficial in a number of ways. First, it greatly enhances communication. If you’re going to be late to pick your child up from school, you can let him\/her know. If you separate while shopping, you can find each other more easily.<\/p>\n Second, you can track where your child is by the GPS on their phone. You can connect with your child more easily via their phone when you are traveling. And you most likely will find that your child is more likely to open up through texting than face-to-face!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Once you’ve established that your child is responsible enough to manage a phone, it’s time to start looking for their first phone. Many parents think about giving their child their phone so they can upgrade to the latest version. I don’t recommend doing this for a couple of reasons:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Before you buy your tween’s first phone, there are a number of things you should consider.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What’s the Plan?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Your child is going to send A LOT of messages.<\/strong> The average American teen sends 3,339 texts a month.<\/a> However, texting nowadays is a bit more hidden. Most tweens\/teens “text” by messaging in Instagram and Snapchat. Texting is probably something you never worried about before, but now you must. Nonetheless, ensure your plan has unlimited texting to avoid overage fees.<\/p>\n What about data?<\/strong> Tweens\/teens love to watch videos on their phone. YouTube is the number one site where people search for video…even more than Google!<\/strong> Why? People like to see the latest movie trailer, a favorite band playing, how to up-do your long hair or advance further in a video game or app. Expect your data usage to soar with your child at the helm of his\/her new device.<\/p>\n Look up the details and conditions on your plan. Are you well-versed on:<\/strong><\/p>\n Look at your available plans. A family plan might work best for you or if you’re worried about the number of texts and data your child will use, you might look into a prepaid plan for him\/her.<\/p>\n Make your child equally responsible for his\/her phone usage. Teach him\/her how to check their minutes to ensure s\/he does not incur overage charges. <\/p>\n If your child abuses this, tell him\/her s\/he will need to pay for anything over the set amount. This won’t be a problem with a prepaid cellphone. Once the minutes\/data of a prepaid plan are used up, there’s no more coverage until the next month.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Parental Controls<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Thankfully, there are tools available to limit your child’s use of phone hours, ability to download apps, restrict harmful websites, and more. Think about it, would your child be able to resist a cookie jar full of cookies if you weren’t around? The same is true for the cellphone. They will need help in adhering to the limits you set.<\/p>\n Check with your mobile provider. Most offer parental controls to help you monitor phone use and look for “warning” words.<\/p>\n In addition, to help steer your child clear of possible issues, consider some type of parental monitoring apps<\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Importance of Privacy<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n Teach your kid about being careful in giving out private data…on their social channels or when filling out information in registering for an app. They should never associate their school, city, phone number birth date, or address in their online communication.<\/strong><\/p>\n Ensure your child uses a password to lock up their phone when not in use.<\/strong> This will keep prying eyes away and ensures another child doesn’t use your child’s accounts to send harmful messages. Your child should tell you the password and keep you updated when s\/he changes it.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n GPS Tracking<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Ensure your child’s phone has GPS tracking on it<\/strong>, and make sure that it’s turned on. This helps in several ways:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Cellphone Contract<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Before giving your child his\/her first phone, create a contract to have him\/her sign. In the contract state the hours s\/he can use the phone, where the phone needs to be charged each night, any limits you have. <\/p>\n Make it clear that the phone belongs to the parents, not the child. You are legally responsible for the phone, as you will be providing the cellphone coverage for it. You reserve the right to check the phone at any time.<\/p>\n See our article on Parental Advice Before Giving Your Child a Phone<\/a><\/span> to help you prepare your child for his\/her first phone.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A cellphone is a great responsibility for your child. It opens a whole new world for him\/her that provides all sorts of opportunity, entertainment, and possible harm. Getting your child involved in the details of your phone plan also helps him\/her to understand contracts and financial obligations.<\/p>\n And lastly, it can open up a whole new line of communication you never had with your child before through the use of text, soon-to-be your child’s native language!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Looking for more great tips? See our previous article, Parental Advice Before Giving Your Child a Phone<\/a>. Our Teens and Cellphones<\/a> Primer also offers more in-depth info. on phone etiquette, sexting, and more.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Next week in our series, we will be covering Apps Your Teen is Using.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Thinking about your tween your phone and upgrading yours? Think again. See our considerations before buying your tween’s first phone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,10,12,13,14,16,2940],"tags":[53,2756,3535,312,2785,266,1128],"class_list":["post-17198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dads","category-how-to","category-iphone","category-kids","category-moms","category-phones","category-teens","tag-cellphones","tag-first-phone","tag-parental-advice","tag-parents","tag-phones","tag-teens","tag-tweens","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/p-content\/themes\/atahualpa342\/images\/articles\/2015\/11\/Buying-your-Tweens-First-Phone-main.jpg?fit=570%2C315&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17198\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnectedmom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Benefits of Your Tween’s First Phone<\/span><\/h2>\n
Why A Hand-Me-Down Phone Is Not The Best Option<\/span><\/h2>\n
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Considerations in Buying Your Tween’s First Phone<\/span><\/h2>\n
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