Tablet for 4 year old?

[shambaby]

My eldest will be 4 in a couple of weeks, and we can't decide whether to get him his own tablet or not. Was hoping for some advice / opinions please.

We know he would love one - we both have iPads (hunny got a new one and I kept the old one) and he alwaysasks to use them. He loves to play games and watch episodes of his favourite tv programs on BBC iPlayer. The concern we have is that it would be harder to limit his use, and he would literally spend all day on it if he could! Sometimes he will even have a little tantrum when told it's time to switch it off. We have started to take away iPad privileges for a day or 2 whenever this happens, which seems to be helping a bit. I am thinking of getting an egg timer to set for a certain period of time, with the rule that when it goes off the iPad goes off. I have seen one in toys r us which has a timer built in to the parental controls, so if that strategy is succesful it might be worth considering. Plus i have a voucher for money off it, so bonus!

Does anyone have any advice / suggestions / recommendations? X

 

[Elphaba12]

Tbh if there are already two iPads in the house I don't really see the need for another one. We have 2 iPads here and DD will ask if she wants to use it and if it's not being used then she is allowed it for a short time.

I'd save yourself the money and just continue as you are, although the timer sounds a good idea if he's reacting badly to having to stop using it

 

[LPF]

We are a house with a near 4 year old and 2 iPads for dh and I. Ds has always loved playing on them...to the point of massive tantrums, constantly asking etc. so we put a ban on its use!

But we realised we could really do with a tablet of some kind as we travel a lot, eat out a bit etc. we bought a cheap kindle fire. It has a great app called freetime which you can set daily limits and the kindle turns off after that time and also means you can't get any purchases etc without the password.

It's also a tad more cumbersome to use than the iPad which is better for little hands as it's not so quick and responsive (ds was always clicking off things on the iPad and getting annoyed)

That said he's currently having a tantrum about using the kindle which has been taken away from him so sometimes I wish tablets hadn't been invented!!!

 

[shambaby]

I see what you mean about not needing another, but we were thinking about it because he would love to have his very own, and we would be able to only have apps and games on there which are suitable for him, so he hasn't got to find what he wants among the 'boring' stuff. Also, I like the idea of one meant for children, with the parental controls. But the tantrums are a worry, will have to see how that goes. He's been great the last few days, since his brief ban and the threat of others, but I wonder how long that will last!

 

[xprincessx]

Callum has an innotab, I would not buy him a proper tablet, not until he is about 8/10 years old. I just think it's completely unnecessary for a child to have their own grown up tablet when there are ones they can use already in the house but that's just my own opinion

 

[meldmac]

Colin has one but he knows if he acts up at all it gets taken away until he starts behaving. It wasn't bought for him but he has it now because I have a mini iPad.

 

[leash27]

We have two iPads at home that we allow DS to use to watch cartoons and play games. We do a lot of travelling as our families live between 2 and 4 hours away so they are great to have in the car too. We have had the odd tantrum and we also have days where iPads are off limits.

We did buy him a Leap Pad for his last birthday but if I'm honest, it's barely been used as he prefers the iPad since the quality of screen is better to watch cartoons and the games are much better and easier to navigate. For this reason, we have bought him a Google Nexus for Christmas. It's a lot cheaper than an iPad (couldn't justify £300 for one present for a 3 year old) but still does the same job.

X

 

[mammy2oaklen]

We've bought ds a samsung galaxy tablet for Xmas he uses our iPad but didn't want to spend that much so got the samsung instead it seems easy to use and similar to iPad I think he will like it. He had a inn oath last year it's just too slow for him he gets really annoyed with it and barely ever uses it.

 

[fairypop]

We are holding out a bit with technology, DS has never used my ipad which may seem a bit mean but I just think he has lots of years ahead for that and what will I buy him later on?! ( I've already bought all the playmobil he could need lol)

Also I worry about his neck, as I have found out I have prolapsed neck discs this year which is a progressive thing, but the consultant said he is seeing more and more cases of it in younger people and puts it down to using tablets and iPhones etc and looking down at them and causing disc erosion in the neck between the c5-6, so it has worried me a bit! I'm not scaremongering, I am a hypochondriac but it does make sense.

Saying that, I have bought a leap tv game station thing, bit like a wii but a kids one and cheaper - as it looked good and educational, ahem!!!

 

[shambaby]

Good points, fairy - to be honest I'm a little uncomfortable with him getting so into technology so soon, but it started with him seeing us use our phones and wanting a go, then just escalated and I think by now there is no going back! I saw something about the leap tv and was going to look into that as an option, too.

And you can never have too much playmobil!

 

[motherofboys]

I have to say I have had bad luck with tablets aimed at children. The boys now can not play on the kurio at all because all profiles say that their time limit has expired. They haven't played it in months. I even went into parental controls section and changed the times, and also created a new profile and it still says the time limit has expired on the new, unplayed, profile. It wouldn't connect to the internet at all, so no updates or downloading new games.
We also had another, no-descript, kids tablet that just failed after a few weeks, and was actually harder for them to use.
They are whizzes with my kindle fire. I'll be getting them a samsung tab 4 for christmas to keep them off my kindle lol
They are 8, 6 and 4.