Speaking as a 15 year old, here are my thoughts. I am not like most of my peers in regards to texting. Almost everyone I see at school, except about 2 students are blinding themselves with their cell phone back lights and almost spraining their ever so excited thumbs texting non stop throughout the day. Although I do have a texting plan, I do not text all that often. When it's dinner time, it's dinner time. I'm not going to sit there and type "lol, lmbo" between bites.
In regards to the different types of texting devices for different age groups, I believe that it's a great idea. For one, I believe that parents should be able to monitor and control their child's usage of the new phone specifically made for elementary school aged children. This allows kids to do what the big kids do, have a little fun, but the parents can control when, where, how, to and from whom the communication via the phone takes place. Plus, as kids want to become more separate from their parents, and want to be with their peers more, the phone allows a sense of relief that the child can contact the parent, or vice versa whenever needed.
In response to the LeapFrog "phone" for toddlers: Great idea. People think that the toddler would become addicted to texting and wouldn't have proper communication skills due to high usage of acronyms. Do you really think this would happen? No. The phone would probably just say: "Type C-A-T." and the owner would do that, teaching them not only communication skills, but spelling and grammar skills too. The LeapFrog "phone" isn't going to be a regular communication device, it's going to be a useful communication device.
I believe that these new products will be marketed towards the children of younger (~20-30 year old) parents, because their parents are familiar with texting, and know how it works. Older parents would just say "Psh, more texting nonsense!"
I urge you, nay sayers of these new devices, to look at the advantages, not just at the disadvantages. If you don't like the product, the solution is simple: Don't buy it. Thanks for reading my opinion.
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Speaking as a 15 year old, here are my thoughts. I am not like most of my peers in regards to texting. Almost everyone I see at school, except about 2 students are blinding themselves with their cell phone back lights and almost spraining their ever so excited thumbs texting non stop throughout the day. Although I do have a texting plan, I do not text all that often. When it's dinner time, it's dinner time. I'm not going to sit there and type "lol, lmbo" between bites. In regards to the different types of texting devices for different age groups, I believe that it's a great idea. For one, I believe that parents should be able to monitor and control their child's usage of the new phone specifically made for elementary school aged children. This allows kids to do what the big kids do, have a little fun, but the parents can control when, where, how, to and from whom the communication via the phone takes place. Plus, as kids want to become more separate from their parents, and want to be with their peers more, the phone allows a sense of relief that the child can contact the parent, or vice versa whenever needed. In response to the LeapFrog "phone" for toddlers: Great idea. People think that the toddler would become addicted to texting and wouldn't have proper communication skills due to high usage of acronyms. Do you really think this would happen? No. The phone would probably just say: "Type C-A-T." and the owner would do that, teaching them not only communication skills, but spelling and grammar skills too. The LeapFrog "phone" isn't going to be a regular communication device, it's going to be a useful communication device. I believe that these new products will be marketed towards the children of younger (~20-30 year old) parents, because their parents are familiar with texting, and know how it works. Older parents would just say "Psh, more texting nonsense!" I urge you, nay sayers of these new devices, to look at the advantages, not just at the disadvantages. If you don't like the product, the solution is simple: Don't buy it. Thanks for reading my opinion.