An educationist, Alhaja Romoke Adedokun, has advised parents to avoid giving mobile phones to underage children to prevent them from going astray.
Adedokun, the Proprietress of Adedokun International Schools, gave the advice on Monday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Ota, Ogun.
She explained that excessive use of social media, often without adequate supervision, is negatively impacting children’s behavior and morals.
Adedokun noted that while social media has its benefits, young users are particularly vulnerable to its adverse effects.
She argued that without proper guidance, children may access inappropriate content that undermines their educational and moral development.
“Social media has its advantages for those who understand it well, but for youths who are still developing, it can lead to harmful behavior if not monitored closely.
“This misuse can compromise the efforts of both schools and parents,”the educationist said.
She recommended that parents refrain from buying smartphones for their secondary school-aged children, arguing that the potential drawbacks outweigh the benefits.
Adedokun suggested that such devices should only be introduced when children reach university age, adding that at that level of education they are more mature and capable of discerning right from wrong.
The educationist also counsels parents against giving phones to underage children
An educationist, Alhaja Romoke Adedokun, has counseled parents against giving mobile phones to underage children to prevent them from going astray.
Adedokun, the Proprietress, Adedokun International Schools, gave the advice while speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Ota, Ogun.
The educationist explained that social media was affecting the children adversely, as some of them were fond of using it excessively without any proper monitoring.
She said this development was affecting the morals of the children in a way which was not useful to their education.
“Social media has its advantages in term of those people that understand it very well, but to our youths that are just coming up, they want to socialise and be technologically inclined without proper guidance.
“That is why this is affecting their morals and they are devising so many vices. On the pretext of using the social media, they begin to enter into websites that are not useful to their development.
“If these children are not properly checked, it could demoralise the efforts of both the schools and parents,” she said.
Adedokun admonished parents against buying android phones for their kids at secondary school level, saying that the damages or disadvantages were more than the advantages.
She said that parents could start buying android phones for their children when they entered the University as they would be more mature to know what was right and wrong.