how to get your kids started with texting: texting 101

Texting is big.

For tweens, it’s really big. It’s like the coolest thing ever.

And everyone is doing it (or so they think), and so Maddy has asked for months and months and months to have her very own phone so she can text her friends. Share photos. Do all the things she thinks every other 9 year old in the world can do except her.

Quite frankly, my husband and I aren’t ready to get her a phone because we don’t think she needs one–and at 9 years old, she really doesn’t. We also don’t want to buy her an iTouch just because the other kids have one; we have two iPads in the house, so we don’t feel like we need another device.

It’s tough—a fine line for parents between creating rules and boundaries with technology and supporting them gently by guiding kids into a safe spot.

So this weekend, we took a big step (for us) into the big time: we got our kids started with texting.

We set the kids up with texting on an older phone, and now they are flying high, feeling good, happy little birds. Like they’re riding the technology cruise ship.

And it’s a start.

Here’s the skinny. . .

How to Get Your Kids Started with Texting: We’ve got our kids set up texting on a freebie platform on our old MyTouch phone.

We created a collaborative account for Maddy, Owen, and Cora under TextPlus Free account. It’s free, and there are ads, so be forewarned.

The kids’ phone which functions only as an android device and not a phone, phone.

However, our kids are pretty good about not touching ads in freebie games, and at 9, 7, and 6, they have a pretty firm understanding that if they touch these ads on purpose, their time online is over.

You need to be careful with TextPlus Free, though, as the ads run in a bar right under the texting box. With this program, users get a number to text from, so we shared that number with aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

Then I added each person to the contact list under names the kids would recognize: Grandma cell, Nanny cell, Aunt Mary, Mom cell, etc.

Yes, the phone needs a little cleaning. . .

. . . but the kids don’t care.

Our goal with this was simple:

to give the kids a bit of controlled freedom as they communicate with family members and friends that we agree upon;

to let them have the feeling they have their own technological ‘space’ to have games that we decide upon and to take photos;

to give them a chance to show us that they can handle this bit of technological freedom and room to breathe.

As protective, first-time parents, we (okay, I) was totally freaking out about this step, so we :

set the settings to the loudest spots so we could hear them texting and knew when new texts came in;

have a rule that the phone stays in the house and on our main living area, not downstairs or in bedrooms;

require that the kids turn off the phone each night and are careful with charging it;

removed all programs we could that were not relevant for the kids;

will allow the child whose day it is to check messages first.

It’s understood that we’re reading along with them, and our first and foremost message was that texting is the same as talking–you interact with respect, kindness, and manners.

We’re learning as we go.

Serious parental learning going on over here, but we feel pretty good about this first baby step as we support our kids with this big step: it’s texting 101, parent-style. Though I use technology every day–many of us do–it is just so important that we walk our kids through these steps instead of throwing them in headfirst or just assuming they know how to handle it.

Are our kids young for this? Probably. But it’s a different day and age, folks, and we’re doing the best we can.