When I was a child in the long summer holidays when I went out and about with my friends our parents had no idea where we were a lot of the time. We had a time to be home and maybe some cash for the phone box. You'll see oldies moaning that those times were better but now I am a parent I am very glad we have the technology to give our children independence whilst being able to stay in touch more easily.
Obviously mobile phones are very much a thing now but anyone who has children knows they can be fairly easily lost. Thankfully now there is also the option of them wearing a My First Fone smart watch with GPS allowing them to know what time it is, listen to music and send and receive messages (sim or e-sim included, subscription required) while you can easily check they got to school or their friends safely.
I used to ask my children to let me know if they moved location. This was great so in theory I'd know if it started raining in the park and they decided to go eat pizza at Bob's house. Of course you have to factor in how useless children can be at remembering instructions. With the My First Fone range of smart watches you can quickly and easily check where they are.
We've been sent the My First Fone R1c to try out. We've previously reviewed the My First Fone R2 model which my autistic daughter loved but donated to a friend's non-verbal but tech-savvy daughter who has a syndrome so rare it took many years to diagnose. It was very kind of my daughter (who has autism) to give up her watch and so I was delighted to be able to offer her the R1c.
Here's a bit more about the R1c - one of a selection of smartwatches from My First Fone. The R1c has a 1.3 inch TFT (liquid crystal) round display/touch screen, a 2MP front camera, 4GB storage, a nano sim and LTE, GSM, WCDMA, wifi and GPS connectivity.
My daughter has limited independence due to her autism so she rarely goes anywhere without me. However as an example of how we use the smartwatch, when she goes to her social group she could subtly let me know if she's had enough and I could make her excuses for her. It's less obvious than her phone.
About that, you might think a phone is enough but the fabulous thing about the My First Fone smartwatches is that access is limited to people on a curated list - for us that's her parents and a couple of siblings. People can only be added by the administrator via an app - that's me. Peace of mind built in for those parents who worry about what (and who) their children can access on an internet enabled device.
This little smartwatch is packed with features which will appeal to young children (and older users, especially those with additional needs) including a music player, camera and fitness tracker.
My daughter is a teenager and appreciates the look of the R1c we are trialling (gifted) as she says it looks just like any adult's smart watch. There's a huge range of colours available across the range as well as different shapes and sizes to choose from, and you can customise the face too.
Wearers can choose to communicate through voice or video calls or messages and parents can set safety boundaries by highlighting geolocations through the iOS or Android app. In practical terms that means if your child wanders more than 200 meters from your holiday home or school, your house or the park you will be alerted.
I could go on and on but unless you are comfortable with a 1970's level of hands-off parenting I would say this is definitely a must-have gadget to allow you to feel secure and your child to feel independent,