Christmas present query

Meursault

Hi All,

I was hoping for some advice from the parents on this forum, regarding suitable Christmas presents..

Our son, who will turn 8 years old at Christmas, has been making enquiries about getting an Xbox from Santa.

I feel that he may be too young to be playing computer games, but he has mentioned that most of the kids in his class and also his cousins (who are a similar age) have an Xbox.

I was hoping to get another year before we finally succumb to the computer game presents. I think he just wants one, without actually having a clear idea why he wants it - that is - XYZ has one, so I want one now.

I assume this is something to do with that bloody Fortnight craze, but if it is standard for kids to have Xboxes, etc, then maybe its time we considered it.

I know this is a classic "first world problem", but i would be grateful for advice anyway.

In fairness to him, he loves his sport and is always outside playing, so I dont really have too many worries about him becoming a couch potato. Its more the suitability issue. We were thinking that most of the kids in his class who have them, actually got them because they have older brothers/sisters.

Anyway, any advice would be great.

Thanks

endacl

Your house your rules. Doesn’t matter a damn what all the other kids have.

worker bee

I would think it is a bit young if it is your oldest /only child.

However, our 7 year old has one - well, it's belonging to our 13 year old but the 7 year old plays it.

I would personally try to hold off another year or even two if possible.

Though we certainly don't have all the answers and aren't raising perfect children perfectly either.

Meursault

endacl wrote: »

Your house your rules. Doesn’t matter a damn what all the other kids have.

I hear you, and we have no problem standing up to him, or anything like that. This was a query to find out at what stage kids normally get these kinds of presents.

I don't know the first thing about computer games, to be honest, and i have never had any interest in playing them. In an ideal world, kids wouldnt see these presents until their teens, as far as I am concerned, but unfortunately it doesnt work like that sometimes.

If there are safe games - FIFA, and perhaps games that have some educational value, etc - that are suitable for kids around 8 years old, then I am willing to consider it, but it would be good to get a general idea, if we are getting ahead of ourselves at this stage.

Meursault

worker bee wrote: »

I would think it is a bit young if it is your oldest /only child.

However, our 7 year old has one - well, it's belonging to our 13 year old but the 7 year old plays it.

I would personally try to hold off another year or even two if possible.

Though we certainly don't have all the answers and aren't raising perfect children perfectly either.

Yeah, exactly, I hear ya. Thats what we were thinking too. The kids in his class have older siblings and its unavoidable, almost, but given that our son is the eldest and will only turn 8 just after christmas, we were worrried that its a bit early....

Thanks again

worker bee

Well, there are safe games to play.
Lego Ninjago, Lego City, Lego Harry Potter etc, Fifa, Farming - are all fun and don't involve realistic car chases or pimps and prostitutes etc.

You can also play offline and just use it as an in-house gaming device - but it does make it easier for him to ask to hook it up to wifi sooner rather than later etc. Whether it's to download add-ons or upgrades etc, and eventually to chat or game with friends.

It just wasn't possible to make the oldest child in our house wait until the youngest turned 10 or 12.

I get what people mean by 'your house, your rules' but I would think it's not something you can stave off forever. We do still have rules about what kind of games, what age levels, how many minutes gaming allowed, what time of day etc.

eastie17

As a father of 4, one of whom is late teens now I would say don't do it yet. Consoles and the games created for them are designed to be addictive, for some kids it can be like putting a bar in the house when they have a drink problem. You can make rules and be strong enough to keep them but the pervasive power of the years of development and billions of lines of code, and money behind them make your rules very difficult to keep and WILL lead to conflict and fights that you currently are not having. While I know there would be massive joy on his part Christmas morning, that morning is not worth the hassle you will have over the following 12 months. The games are usually fairly immersive and coded to hit all of the right pleasure centers of the brain and its very difficult to compete with them.
I would suggest to wait until he is at least in double figures and even then think carefully and maybe start with something smaller like a hand held game such as the Nintendo 2DS and see how he gets on with boundaries.
Yes there is an element of peer pressure but hes young enough for that not to be a major issue. I work in tech myself so am far from a luddite but am speaking from experience of someone who bought the consoles when they were younger and applied rules etc. but the consoles and gaming have been the biggest source of conflict over the years, way over the other stuff that you expect to have issues with, with kids and teenagers such as doing jobs around the house, school, exams, girlfriends, drinking, staying out late, attitude, hormones etc etc.

Read this, the people who are at the center of this industry are trying to keep their kids away from entertainment tech as long as possible as they know the damage it can potentially cause:

http://uk.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-parents-raising-their-kids-tech-free-red-flag-2018-2?r=US&IR=T

Meursault

worker bee wrote: »

Well, there are safe games to play.
Lego Ninjago, Lego City, Lego Harry Potter etc, Fifa, Farming - are all fun and don't involve realistic car chases or pimps and prostitutes etc.

You can also play offline and just use it as an in-house gaming device - but it does make it easier for him to ask to hook it up to wifi sooner rather than later etc. Whether it's to download add-ons or upgrades etc, and eventually to chat or game with friends.

It just wasn't possible to make the oldest child in our house wait until the youngest turned 10 or 12.

I get what people mean by 'your house, your rules' but I would think it's not something you can stave off forever. We do still have rules about what kind of games, what age levels, how many minutes gaming allowed, what time of day etc.

I agree with you. We all have the best of intentions, and in an ideal world, these types of gifts wouldnt come in the door until they are teenagers, but that is difficult enough to enforce, in reality.

I think we might try avoid if possible this year.

Thanks for your advice.

whelan2

My youngest is 10. He got ps4 with fifa last Christmas. Fortnight is not allowed in this house. I don't care who in the class is on it. He is mad into football and he is scared stiff of becoming addicted to the ps4. He has a cousin who is always playing some form of technology
and doesn't want to be like him. He could go weeks without playing the ps4. As others said your house your rules

meeeeh

Ours got PS4 when he was almost 8 (he'll be 10 in February). That being said he is only allowed to play ofline, not a chance in hell to let him play Fortnite and we have parental controls and time limits on everything. I'm not against kids playing games but whatever console you get them you also have to make sure you only allow what you are comfortable with. Also if you are going to buy something make sure it's the one he really wants because you could be pestered to get Nintendo Switch in a few months time. It seems to be very popular with kids that age.

Tombo2001

I would strongly advise against Santa bringing this present.

Why - because then he 'owns' it; it belongs to him - and a child can quite reasonably say, this is mine, Santa gave it to me, it belongs to me, you cant tell me what I can or cant do with it.

I think its important that if you decide to get the XBOX - that you own it, that you buy the games and that he is 100% clear that this belongs to you and not to him, and that you set the rules.

FYI, we have an XBOX - I've commented a bit on the Fortnite thread about this. It certainly changes the house when it comes in. I would definitely distinguish between Fortnite and all other games in this regard.

As another poster said, games are designed to be addictive and Fortnite particularly so.

I'd say any ambitions of getting him to play chess on it will be short lived.

I have no problem with games like FIFA - and to be fair, given how much time the average adult spends glued to their phone I think most of us are in no great position to be taking a moral high ground with kids about not letting them use technology.

beauf

If I was doing it again I wouldn't get it.

Some kids can use them responsibly. For others it's like crack.

Good social tool if used with limits. But like the other poster said. No end of conflict over it, with one child. Others not that bothered.

killanena

When I was 7-8 everyone of my friends and I had a Nintendo 64 and soon after a PlayStation 1. So I wouldn't consider it too young to get a console.

But back then games were mostly marketed for kids. These days a lot of games have adults as their target audience so you have to be vigilant with what games he plays. Also I wouldn't subscribe him to Xbox live for another few years. This will prevent him from playing online.

My biggest cause of concern for kids when it comes to gaming isn't the games themselves but the people you talk too and play with when online.

meeeeh

We use this and set the limits. They know what the rules are and that's it. Personally I think if you let kids use internet or play on different consoles then you also need to buy one of devices that control the usage.

https://www.amazon.com/Circle-Disney-Parental-Controls-Connected/dp/B019RC1EI8

Meursault

meeeeh wrote: »

We use this and set the limits. They know what the rules are and that's it. Personally I think if you let kids use internet or play on different consoles then you also need to buy one of devices that control the usage.

https://www.amazon.com/Circle-Disney-Parental-Controls-Connected/dp/B019RC1EI8

that looks very useful alright. thanks for the advice.

farmchoice

our lad got one last year when he was just turning 8. he was mad to get it to play fifa 18.

anyway we got it and i have no regrets, hes a very active kid so no worries there.
he is absolutely not allowed play it online and i think this is the big thing. playing an xbox or ps4 is no different then playing computer games 20/30 years ago on a commador 64 or the old Nintendos or a saga or whatever, it only gets different when you communicate on line with others.


in fact the threat of having the play station taken away is handy one to have in the arsenal when it comes to discipline.



if Santa is good enough to get him one make sure he takes it out of the box sometime before Christmas and sets it all up so as to avoid a very stressful few hours on Christmas morning.


I'm no expert but i believe this is even more true of an xbox as there are no physical disc so everything has to be downloaded.

CelticRambler

My children were each introduced to the concept of video games at the age of about 6 months ... mainly because their dad played them while on parental duty (mostly the strategy type - Flight Simulator, Minesweeper, Tetris ) so without meaning to, our household had the arrangement described by Tombo2001 where no one child had any game to call their own. As we added games (and DVDs - we never had TV), they were always family purchases. That made it very easy to enforce a "living room only" rule and not have any of them claim ownership.

In his teenage years, SonNo.1 began to show signs of becomming addicted to a few MMORPGs. It wasn't practical to ban him from the computer completely, because he needed to use it for schoolwork, or disconnect our wifi because I needed it for my work. Instead, he was told he could have a certain number of games-hours per week, and it was for him to decide how to ration his time. Again, without meaning to, that actually made the games more challenging for him, as he had to decide when to plant/harvest his cabbages or when to send his troops off on a march ... But he got his homework done, and got his CAO points. :cool:

If I was starting again, I'd probably do it pretty much the same way: family phones, family tablets, family consoles - and family rules.

CircleofLife

If you are considering 'caving' and getting him a console, the Nintendo Switch may be a better match for a kid of his age. The majority of their games are aimed at kids too.

Mink

My parents put their foot down about no computer games (the traditional fast/action/violence ones) in the house until we were well into our teens and could buy our own at that point. We just accepted it and they were so emphatic about it & explained it and we knew there was no point arguing it.

We were allowed sim city (this is when it first came out, completely different to what's out today) and a typing program and a maths game and we were allowed Dungeons and Dragons - basically any slow moving puzzle game.

My friends definitely had various versions of whatever console was out in the 90's and lots of nintendos flying around. But we just accepted it and we never actually went and got a console when we hit teens as couldn't be bothered as we weren't interested in it at that point.

The_Honeybadger

My son got one at 8 he plays a lightning McQueen racing game and a few of the Lego games but doesn’t play it every day, probably a couple of times a week at most. I don’t allow him to go online

He asked about getting fortnite but having read a bit about it at that stage I made it very clear that it was out of the question.

It sounds like your son is sensible and has varied interests so I wouldn’t see the harm personally as long as you are mindful of the age appropriateness of certain games.

jester77

It depends on the games he would be playing. Some games are good at exercising the brain. I wouldn't just rule it out.

My 4 year old plays some games on the tablet. Watching him completing the 2 monument valley games was fascinating, it really had him thinking how to solve the puzzles, plus there was some dexterity and coordination involved in moving things around.

Proper supervision with strict play times would be the way to go.

AceCard Jones

What benefits do you hope to gain by pushing this out a further year? The more time that passes before he gets his own console, the older he is before learning how to deal with any rules you lay down in relation to their use. I personally had a console in my house from the age of 4 and I developed into a functional member of society and learned at an early age how to have interests both in and outside the house.

Yes, there were conflicts with my parents in relation to their use from time to time but learning the boundaries earlier meant I grew up knowing about balance form an early age. You still ultimately have the power to decide what he plays and that everything he does is age appropriate. People downplay the whole idea of the child's friends having X gadget by saying "Your house, your rules". Yes, this is true but being left out/isolated at school or with your friends is a huge deal for kids.

I often see advice on boards in relation to raising children where it really just feels like some parents want their kids to be the EXACT person they expect them to be and have no sense of individuality. (Not accusing you of this by the way)

I reckon get him the Xbox, he is more than old enough and needs to learn how to moderate his use now before he turns into a teenager. I will be taking this approach and if I'm not familiar with a technology my child wants I will make it my job to do so and monitor their use of it. With Family Controls available on all devices now this is easier than ever.

Meursault

Meursault wrote: »

I feel that he may be too young to be playing computer games, but he has mentioned that most of the kids in his class and also his cousins (who are a similar age) have an Xbox.

I think my advice would be to shut down that line of argument instantly. As soon as you give into it on one subject it will be used against you on every other. All my friends have this clothing label - a phone - go to Disney Land - stay out late - get this amount of pocket money. It will not end. My daughter tried this one related to getting her own phone and SIM card and I shut down that line of argument as quickly as it came up.

As for computer games and gaming - that is a more difficult one as it is something that is a huge part of our society and culture and the lives of our teens. I obsessed over this one in particular myself for awhile and came up with the solution that worked for me. Might not work for you but I will lay it out anyway. Growing up I was a gamer and I now very infrequently do still buy a game and binge play it to completion.

So to pre-empt the worries about them becoming couch potatoes or gaming instead of studying and so forth - but also to pre-empt them never having gaming when their friends do - I have a PC and a games machine. For me. And have informed them that it is not something I will buy for them. That means there is one in my house - but it is mine not theirs - and gaming is something I can occasionally do _with_ them. And very very occasionally I can lend it to them to do alone. But the power dynamic lies entirely with me in a way that it wouldn't if it was "their" machine.

And I do enjoy a bit of gaming with them at times. I find we enjoy it. But I also find we talk together as mates when we game and not as father and child. Gaming is kind of a social equializer and for us at least it erodes the parental-child barrier and makes us "mates" and it kinda effects how we talk as we game. We throw insults - discuss topics we otherwise might not - and it becomes quite quality time. Especially as I do not over do it so it remains a luxury and special event rather than an expected routine.