Collective effort: Parents of primary school pupils sign up to code to hold off on buying their children a smartphone

The “everyone else in the class has one” plea is increasingly less likely to cut it for primary pupils.

As the age at which children are putting smartphones on their wish lists is reducing, mums and dads are under big emotional pressure.

Children will try to wear down resistance with the-age old entreaty that if they don’t get one, they will be the only one of their peers being denied.

Now parents in a Co Wicklow primary school are the latest to sign up to a voluntary code to hold off on this purchase for children until they hit second-level.

The 480-pupil St Kevin’s NS, Greystones, already has a policy banning the use of smartphones by pupils during school hours or on the school premises.

The new code will take that a step further as parents sign up to a collective agreement not to allow their children to own a smartphone up to and including sixth class.

Pressure tends to build from about third class, with the latest report from the CybersafeKids charity showing that 30pc of eight and nine-year-olds own smartphones, rising to 77pc by the time they are 12.

While the St Kevin’s code is voluntary, and will respect families which, for one reason or another, feel it is important for their child to have a smartphone, they are hoping for a high uptake.

The move comes against rising concerns about the impact on children of smartphone ownership because of unfettered access to social media and all that the internet offers through a device they can carry around in a pocket.

Links are drawn between social media and rising anxiety levels among children because of how it can expose them to 24/7 bullying, online predators and influencers and inappropriate content.

St Kevin’s Parents’ Association chairperson Phil Moyles said the idea was to have a collective agreement to hold off on smartphones and so reduce peer pressure and to support parents, with data showing that, for instance, “85pc of fourth class parents have opted in to the code”.

Erika Clune, who has two children at St Kevin’s, took the idea to the association after seeing it roll out in another primary school, in nearby Delgany.

Ms Clune, a second-level teacher, has had her eyes opened wide to dangers posed by the cyberworld, all too easily accessed via smartphones.

“We are in this world and we are not going to be able to bubblewrap our kids, but at least we could postpone it for the primary school years, and, hopefully, allow children a chance to build more resilience and coping mechanisms,” she said.

The St Kevin’s code will be formally launched in September and parents are being asked to sign up anonymously. Many have already done so.

While the idea is being embraced by parents associated with these two schools, CyberSafeKids CEO Alex Cooney says such initiatives “are rarer than I would like”.