«We were young and had no idea»

Dear parents, we keep hearing from you that we are on our mobile phones too much, that we are addicted to mobile phones and similar comments. I understand what you mean and yet I think it's unfair. You didn't grow up with a mobile phone nearby, you didn't realise that there was such a great new device on which you could do so many things.

But you now also have a smartphone that you use very often. When I was growing up, I didn't notice much about mobile phones either. Of course, it was different to you because it didn't exist yet, but I grew up as if mobile phones were only for emergencies. I certainly didn't know that something like Facebook existed. So I grew up rather «old-fashioned». In middle school, the other children suddenly had mobile phones and only talked about them.

It would have helped us a lot if we'd had parents who explained to us the dangers of social media.

Fire and flame for Tiktok

I got my mobile phone in sixth grade. Tiktok became popular at that time. I downloaded it too and was immediately hooked. But it distracted me a lot and I couldn't concentrate properly on school. I was sometimes on Tiktok for a whole hour and before I knew it, it was time for dinner.

Many other children felt the same way, some were almost addicted to it. We didn't know that much about social media back then and some of us posted videos and pictures of ourselves with a public profile. Because we were so young, most of us didn't realise that people from all over the world could see these videos. Also, most people my age had no idea what was behind social media and that everything we did was being recorded.

I think it would have helped us a lot if we'd had an explanatory video, a workshop at school or parents who explained to us what the dangers of social media are and how we can protect ourselves from them. Even if you parents say that we children are on our mobile phones for too long, you could also have introduced mobile phone rules. One example of a mobile phone rule is that the mobile phone must not be in the room at night.

My suggestion is that parents set up the children's mobile phones so that they have screen time until they are about 14 years old and have to have it confirmed by the parents if they want to download a new app. I had this restriction and I have to say that I was sometimes very grateful for it.

Have screen time under control

Of course, it's annoying when you have to download something for school and need confirmation first, or when you're travelling for a long time and have nothing to do and then need to extend your screen time. But it helps you to have better control over your screen time in future.

Thank you for reading,
Malinka