Here’s What You Can Do With Apple’s New Parental Controls in IOS 12
Parents, to limit your child’s phone use, you no longer need to hold their chargers hostage, shout out nightly countdowns ( “Three more minutes!” ), Or draw up complex technical contracts that you watch exactly once. At least if you are using Apple devices. The new iOS 12 parental controls are here, and they let you control your kids’ screen time – set app time limits, block idle periods, and track their daily habits – all from your own phone. Here’s what you can do and how to do it.
How to access your child’s screen time feature from your own device:
- Make sure you have iOS 12 installed on both of your devices.
- Set up Family Sharing if you haven’t already.
- Go to Settings> Screen Time.
- Scroll down to the names of your family members. Select the child you want to set up parental controls for.
- Enter your four-digit screen time access code. Choose the one that you remember, and your child will not be able to guess. You will need it to approve requests for additional screen time.
Now let’s see what you can do with Screen Time.
Prevent your child from using the phone during family dinner or before bed
Feature: Downtime
How it works: Schedule a length of time remotely during which your child’s device cannot be used, such as a family dinner or his little sister’s flute concert. During this period of time, an icon will appear in all its applications, indicating that their use is prohibited. (Phone, Messages, FaceTime, Alarm and some other features will still work by default, but you can also turn them off if you want.) If there are apps that you want your child to have access to during a scheduled downtime – say, meditations before bed or white noise – you can make them Permitted.
Tip: It may be helpful to talk about your limits with other parents in your area. If you all have a plan to block your kids from their apps at the same time, perhaps they CAN- choke- Call each other on the phone or even post an IRL.
Set time limits in Fortnite (or any app)
Feature: app restrictions
How it works: Set a specific amount of time your child can be in certain apps each day. You can set restrictions for certain categories, such as social media or games, or for all applications. (It’s a little frustrating, though, since you can’t tell which apps fall into which categories.) A warning will appear five minutes before the time expires, preventing screams of shock and despair. Once the allotted limit is reached, your child can send you a request for extra time, and you can either approve it or not.
See how your child actually spends time with the phone.
Function: activity reports
How it works: On your device, you can view daily and weekly activity reports showing how much time your child spends in each app (or different categories of apps), as well as the number of notifications they receive and how often they pick up their phone. It’s a way to find out if he’s sneaking in games during his third math lesson, or playing Roblox when he’s supposed to be reading in his room.
Reports can also be a good place to start a conversation with your kids about screen time, especially if you’re tracking your phone usage. (Yes, and it’s a little scary.) You can ask your kids how much time they think they spend with their phones and then compare that to the actual data. As Tommy Sobela, founder and CEO of Brick , writes : “Most people use their phones twice as much as they think they are doing, so seeing your actual minutes spent can be an incredibly powerful incentive to get real with yourself. by yourself and getting motivated about you need to take control of your phone habits. “
Block content and disable in-app purchases and location services
Feature: Content and Privacy Restrictions
How it works: We have long been able to restrict children’s access to music, movies and other content on Apple devices, but with iOS 12 we can now do it all remotely. In iTunes Purchases and App Store, you can choose whether your child can install new apps, uninstall apps, or make in-app purchases. In the Content Restrictions section, you can set content ratings for books, music, TV shows, movies, and apps. (I love how specific you can be – for example, you might want to block “explicit” TV shows, giving your child unlimited access to books.) If you don’t want any app to find out your child’s whereabouts, you can indicate that. too much.
As your kids get older and demonstrate that they can use their phones responsibly, you’ll want to change your screen time settings in a way that makes sense. Let it be a constant conversation. If you’re looking for topics of conversation, check out our age guide on how to set smartphone restrictions for your kids .