As people talk about the downsides of smartphones for teenagers, parents are turning to smartwatches as a way to keep in touch with their young children while avoiding full access to the internet and social media on their phones. .
At least, that was the story a few years ago. But these days, more and more companies are selling smartwatches to children as young as 4 and 5 years old. And at younger ages, it’s not the child who requests the device, but the parent who is concerned about their safety and wants to keep an eye on their child.
This is how EdSurge senior reporter Emily Tate Sullivan spent months researching the recent craze for children’s smartwatches for a feature EdSurge published in collaboration with WIRED magazine last week. This is what I discovered.
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“The worst-case scenario is always looming in the minds of the parents I talk to,” she says. “These parents are thinking, ‘If there’s a school shooting or a lockdown, I want to be able to communicate with my child in a locked-down classroom.’ I want to know exactly where they are. Maybe they still have a watch on their wrist and I can track them.” So these are very unlikely, but they do matter. Not. Fear is widespread. That’s a really powerful force. ”
But while parents are concerned about their children’s physical safety when handing them smartwatches, they may not consider the downsides of starting their digital lives too early, according to digital media experts. That’s what it means. And schools are increasingly seeing devices as a distraction, sometimes leading parents to text their children during class. However, watches are often not included in smartphone bans in schools, and watches are not always mentioned in conversations about the impact of digital devices on children.
This week on the EdSurge podcast, we go behind the story with an interview with Tate Sullivan. This also includes details she wasn’t able to fit into the final part. Later in the episode, you can listen to this story in podcast format as the author reads the full article.
Listen to the episode of spotify, apple podcast Or in the player below.
