Do you limit smartphone use around your family?

[GracieJane]

Do you keep your phone on you and check it during the day or do you keep it elsewhere? If you set limits to phone use, what are they?

[Katy]

I check it all the time.  The kids devices stay in public areas & are charged in the kitchen. 

[Spryte]

Limiting our own use?  No.  It’s summer, so I’m here more than normal, but even during the school year, my phone is my brain.  🤣 Other than this site, I do zero social media.  No FB, Twitter, whatever.  None. But my phone is a tool, and I need it. Not only do I keep it on hand for phone calls and texts, it’s my daily routine reminder.

I use the calendar and reminders all day.  If we are going somewhere, Waze tells me if traffic is building up.  I log all foods and exercise into Carb Manager.  The Home Routines app periodically reminds me to do X at a particular time of day.  I manage the kids’ allowance and extra chore money as they earn extras with GreenLight.  Banking, doc office communications, more … all on my phone, in my pocket.

And because we use BYL, I download their yearly course work into my Files, so I can access their schedules from my phone.  Don’t know what to do next? Mom whips out her phone and consults it.  Ok.  Read pp. X - Z and write ABC.  I love that feature. From there, I can also print any necessary pages, and use the links in the file to order books for the next week.

Kids only use their phones in public spaces between 3 - 8 pm.  No phones in bedrooms or bathrooms.

Edited August 2, 2021 by Spryte

[73349]

I need my to do list, housekeeping, and grocery/meal planning apps on my phone, so I use it frequently. Not social media/general web browsing/reading the news/etc. (I do those on a laptop), and not at the table.

Edited August 2, 2021 by Carolina Wren

[Pawz4me]

No limits. We're all adults. We all keep our phones close because we use them for so many things. We never limited the boys when they were younger, either. It wasn't ever a big problem, so we never had a real reason to consider limiting use.

[Arcadia]

My kids aren’t allowed to look at their phones while they are attending classes on Zoom. Its a basic courtesy. Their phones are still on their desk.

I actually don’t keep my phone with me unless I am waiting for a callback or an email reply. 

[SKL]

Personally, I dislike using my smart phone.  It is purely a tool for me, with the exception that when I have no choice but to sit quietly doing nothing, I might play a game.

My kids use theirs more than I use mine.  One doesn't really go overboard.  The other one probably does, but she is 14.5, and I don't feel the need to limit her except as discipline for poor choices.

[kristin0713]

We have a rule of no devices at the table (like during a meal).  My phone is usually in my pocket or on a counter somewhere. I have an apple watch so I don't feel the need to check my phone all the time.  But really, I can see anything that comes through on my watch immediately, so I guess I am checking it all the time.  

[Carrie12345]

My family is always around, so no. I use it when I need/want to. 

[marbel]

I keep my phone close to me during the day - in my pocket if I can, as I have an app on it that counts steps - but I don't frequently check it. Do you mean check for email, text, and other alerts?  If that's what you mean, no, I don't check it. But I use it for a lot of things - lists, reminders, exercise tracking (I don't just mean the steps I take walking around the house, though it's fun to see that at the end of the day), finding recipes, using a Bible app, Kindle app, audiobooks and podcasts. 

We sometimes end up with all our phones out at the dinner table. Someone will mention something of interest, and we'll pull out phones to look stuff up, share puppy videos, look up a place we might go together if we ever have a chance to go someplace together, etc. But we are all adults in the house now. 

[Pawz4me]

Here lately I'm spending a lot of phone time using the calculator app, working out percentages for Covid stats.

[Spryte]

1 hour ago, Pawz4me said:

Here lately I'm spending a lot of phone time using the calculator app, working out percentages for Covid stats.

I don’t know why that made me laugh, but that prompted a serious coffee snort.  🤣 Dark humor?  Gotta laugh or cry, right?

@GracieJane … are you limiting your smart phone use around family?  

[Pen]

Not limiting much at this stage. 
 

I do try to put it at at least a little distance when not actually using it — for health reasons. I do carry it in pocket some but realizing how much I was doing that I put an emf shielding piece of fabric toward my body 

Limited  always when homeschool was in session (also applied to non emergency disruptions/use of landlines and computers), and when my son was younger (easier to do for me than many people  because home had no service then, so it was only something I did when at places there was service such as while waiting as he did his sports ).  
 

Wifi that we now got in our area, and electronics are turned off at night still

[TexasProud]

Well, half the time I do not know where my phone is LOL..  I do my posting here or on Facebook (very rarely) on my computer. I do not do much on my phone. My daughter teases me that she if she has one phone call, she will not call me  because I never answer. 🙂

[Eos]

I don't have a smart phone.  My ancient flip phone that I used for traveling has died and I won't be getting anther one.  My kids don't use theirs when we're in family time.  We didn't let them get smart phones until each was 16, same as dating. 

[TexasProud]

6 minutes ago, Harpymom said:

 We didn't let them get smart phones until each was 16, same as dating. 

LOL, mine got dumb phones when they started driving at 16 and no smart phone until college.  We are considered pretty strange around here! Their friends had phones in early elementary school.

[Carrie12345]

16 minutes ago, Harpymom said:

I don't have a smart phone.  My ancient flip phone that I used for traveling has died and I won't be getting anther one.  My kids don't use theirs when we're in family time.  We didn't let them get smart phones until each was 16, same as dating. 

I’m not saying anyone *should* get their kids smart phones early, but I will say I was so glad mine had theirs when I was driving an unfamiliar area and my phone (using GPS directions because my car’s is broken) completely malfunctioned and I had no idea how to get to my destination or back from it. 🤣🤣🤣 I couldn’t even access the phone number for where I was going. I keep paper maps in my car, but they’re for, like, outrunning an impending natural disaster, not finding a friend’s street address. I hadn’t been that panicked since 1998, lol.

[Eos]

nm

Edited August 3, 2021 by Harpymom

[Eos]

I'm sorry, I'm not intending to hijack this thread!  This is about limiting one's use around family.  So no, I don't.

[TexasProud]

5 minutes ago, Carrie12345 said:

I’m not saying anyone *should* get their kids smart phones early, but I will say I was so glad mine had theirs when I was driving an unfamiliar area and my phone (using GPS directions because my car’s is broken) completely malfunctioned and I had no idea how to get to my destination or back from it. 🤣🤣🤣 I couldn’t even access the phone number for where I was going. I keep paper maps in my car, but they’re for, like, outrunning an impending natural disaster, not finding a friend’s street address. I hadn’t been that panicked since 1998, lol.

LOL. I only got a smart phone in the last couple of years, so paper maps are a must. Our children just drove in our small little town. No getting lost here. Don't know if it is bad or not, but the first time they drove longer than 30 minutes away was going to college. 🙂 

[Lady Florida.]

I check mine all the time. We have only adults in the house and we all check our phones all the time around each other. We don't do it rudely in the middle of conversations but we don't limit either.

[GracieJane]

7 hours ago, Spryte said:

I don’t know why that made me laugh, but that prompted a serious coffee snort.  🤣 Dark humor?  Gotta laugh or cry, right?

@GracieJane … are you limiting your smart phone use around family?  

No, I don’t, but I’m considering it. 🙂

[dsmith]

The only limit here is no phone use at the dinner table or when we have guests unless there are work issues going on. I've personally been avoiding using it for an hour before bed. I do have an apple watch, so I can see any texts or calls but I don't really check.