We just had a ginormous fight at our house about this very topic. My 16-year-old daughter has a cell phone. We bought it for her for her 14th birthday and paid for three months of service. After that she was responsible for paying her share of the bill. We've stuck to that deal and so has she. At the first of every month, she gives us $50. Like Giyen, we communicate with her so much via texting, especially when she's in school and can't have her ringer turned on. She works for several families in our neighborhood as well and they ALL communicate with her via text. In the past we've had a few issues with the phone (texting during class or in the middle of the night etc.), but we've got a handle on that now. She hates getting her phone taken away from her. But even worse, my husband and I hate it too because we are then inconvenienced and unable to communicate with her quickly and easily. My 11-year-old son just started middle school and wants a cell phone. First of all for fairness sake, I think he may need to wait until he's 14. But the bigger fight for us was can he be responsible with it? For him, right now, the answer is no. He would spend all of his time texting, or playing games etc. It is too much of a distraction for him. In addition, he loses everything, so I don't want to invest $200 in a phone for him and at this point it isn't mission critical. So after all of that, I think my point is that cell phones can be a great tool for your family's communication, but you have to weigh the pros and cons of it with each child.

My kids can get cell phones when they can pay for them themselves. Done and done. Personally I feel they create more drama than they're worth. I bought my first one on my own. My brothers were more fortunate and my parents paid for theirs and all they did was disrupt family meals with texting and phone calls. Forget it. The last time I was in the cell phone store getting my phone upgrade there was a woman in her mid-thirties who had to call her father to get her plan straightened out because she was STILL on her family plan. Mid-thirties people!

I think cell phones can be OK if approached in the proper way. If you have a very active kid, I think a cell phone can be a good way to keep track of what's going on like practices getting canceled or a yearbook meeting popping up. I think any child that is given freedom to drive or go out with friends should have a cell phone, again this is for you to keep track of them not for them to keep track of you. The cell phone should not act as a baby sitter; I think people get to comfortable with letting their kids run free because they have a cell phone in case something happens. Let's be honest, no kid is going to call home when a stranger picks them up. I have several years before I'm faced with kids and phones, but for now this is my plan. I will buy cheap phones that a child would be embarrassed to carry with them, and prepaid minutes. The only time the phones will be used is when my children are out at school functions or out with friends. They will be required to call and check in with home and when they are in need of parental help. When said child returns home, the phone goes in a designated spot and does not get touched again until the phone is needed for the next outing. When said child reaches 16-18 then we'll talk about a more liberal phone plan. Until I'm thinking one of those phones that is bright green with four buttons... call mom, call dad, call home, call 911... I like this plan...

Ugh, do not want to think about this, or internet + kids. Terrifying. All I know is my mom got me one in high school because I was on the drill team and she didn't want me waiting in the dark in the parking lot after a football game. (I.e., safety.) It's not that I think that's the only reason to give a kid/teen a cell phone, but I think it's a good one. "Because I want to text my friends" seems kind of weak to me...

I read this timely article on choosing appropriate cell phones for kids last week, which may help moms weighing this question decide what phones are appropriate at what age. I think part of the problem is that those of us who have memories of corded phones that we would stretch as far as we could away from the nosy ears of our parents in order to whisper to our friends about how much algebra sucks, think of cell phones through that metaphor. We see them as phones first, and in the houses we grew up in, there was only one line of access, even call waiting was a luxury, and since there was no email, IM, or other communication device, these phones were our lifelines. Getting to talk on the phone was right of passage. Our kids do not view it this way, and they never will. A cell phone is merely a device by which they stay connected to the people they know. That connection is an assumed way of life for today's kids. There is nothing novel about chatting with your friends while playing an XBox game for them. It is taken for granted, because they are natives to using technology. I think it's important that we not be too attached to our old metaphors of "teen lines" (Oh how many times I begged my parents for one!) and family phones. And instead think about the number of notes we wrote and folded in an average day of school, discretely passing them back and forth. Think of texting as the modern version of that, and remember that it is the primary way that kids use cell phone, not talking. They also use them to play games and surf the net, much like a small portable computer. Why we think of those functions as "extras" (primary function in our mind, being to talk), our kids see these functions as more essential.

My son is very young, so I won't really have to deal with this for like, 10 more years. But, I wasn't allowed to have a cell phone until I was 18, and even then it was for emergencies only because my mom was footing the bill while I was in college. And, I had to use the one shared family landline, and I had time slots where I could use it, and most of the time I was not allowed to sit and gab on the phone. But, that was a long time ago. I'm not oblivious to the new technologies and services cell phones offer and how convenient they can be, I have a G1 myself. But, when it comes to kids, that's all beside the point. If you give your child a cell phone, it should be a lesson in responsibility, or a tool for emergencies or getting in touch with you and your spouse, but not an electronic distraction free-for-all. My youngest brother-in-law is 18, and he has had a cell phone since the 8th grade. My mother-in-law gave it to him with all the bells and whistles and allowed him to use it fully at his own discretion. At 12 years old. And now she sits around and complains about her giant cell phone bills and how her son is failing out of all of his classes. Also, my 16 year old cousin has a phone, and so do all of her friends, and they sit around all day and write nasty texts to girls they don't like to make them feel bad about themselves, which we found out when she accidentally sent one to my grandmother. This is like modern age bullying, without that whole hassle of adults seeing or hearing anything in order to stop it. So, if you want to give a young kid a phone, fine. But BE AN EFFING PARENT when it comes to how much they use it, what features they have, when they can use it, etc. Be firm, make rules, they may break them but at least you set some guidelines. Personally, I don't see myself giving one to my son before he has his license and will be driving around alone. Then, I can see the practicality of it. I'm not going to give it to him so he can text me all day long. I'd rather have a face-to-face conversation with him when he gets home. Humans are losing that necessary interaction because they rely heavily on electronic communication. I know a lot can change between now and when I actually have this issue crop up for our family, but I know I don't stand where most people do here and now.

I got my first cell phone when I was 16... remember when they were larger then your head and you had to carry around a huge battery pack box... ummm yeah, one of those. It went with the car that I got as well. My parents believed in keeping up with the Jones so I did not mind at all. I racked up HUGE phone bills... I mean HUGE. I started dating my DH when I was 16 so we spent a TON of time on the phone. I think 13/14 is way too young to get a cell phone. I think kids are doing things way to young these days. I am going to wait to let my daughter get a cell phone until she can drive. If she needs to get a hold of me until then she can either use one of her friends phones or we will let her use my cell or her dads cell for emergency only. It does not help that at the tender age of 4 years old she knows how to use a cell phone but that came out of safety.... I was passing out due to my blood pressure and since DH works a lot it made sense to make sure that she could call daddy if I were to pass out or God forbid something else bad happened. Ended up me teaching her how to use the cell saved my life because I passed out and fell down the stairs one night.... she was 3. She went and found my cell phone, found daddy's picture in my adress box and hit send and was able to tell him what happened (although she said that I fell asleep walking up the stairs).... from what I was told, she called her grandpa and grandma too. So in saying that I think kids need to know how to use cell phones but I do not think that they are needed until they are driving age. Even then they should save up to buy the phone themselves and they should pay for the bill monthly. They need to learn real life!

Like most of the other commenters, most of what I have to say on this subject involves RESPONSIBILITY. Every kid is different, and not every kid is capable of being responsible for an expensive electronic gadget with ongoing costs. (not to mention late-night bf/gf phone drama and the whole sexting thing.) I know 12 year olds that are definitely responsible enough, and I also know 16 year olds who are not. Continual enforcement of rules is so huge here, on the part of the parents. We have to enforce the phone as a privilege, not an inalienable right. One thing I want to add, as a teacher, is that a huge number of kids who seem to have absolutely no impulse control while in school regarding their cell phones. It doesn't matter what the rules are; it doesn't matter what the consequences are; they just can't NOT look at the text or NOT respond while in class. We used to pass notes. They text. And it is a HUGE distraction.