I don’t think this one is really within your control. Sure, you could take away his smart phone, but you can’t stop him from getting himself one in a couple of years. Better he learns good cell phone etiquette (was there even such a thing 5 years ago?) and how to manage the distraction now than that he try to sort it out as a brand new college student.
ETA: one of D2’s teachers in high school used to send group texts to everyone in the class with updates pertaining to assignments, etc. D2’s cell at the time wasn’t capable of receiving them, so the teacher just didn’t bother to include her in those communications.
I think you’re just mourning the closeness you once shared, where without distractions he (and his debate friends) would laugh and share and engage you. The only thing that worries me is the lack of sleep. I’d make him go to bed on time and keep his phone and laptop out of his room when it’s time for bed.
It’s a frustrating issue. But… 40 years ago there were complaints about teen children (I think more girls) who would spend hours talkng on the landline. Some families installed a 2nd landline. That we don’t hear about anymore 
Although I would have liked DS using his phone less in hs, I will say that it helped him be part of more in-person social activities. A group text would go out - “meet at the movie theater in the mall at 8pm of you want to join us for ________”. If he was busy for homework he skipped, but if he had free time he went. We rarely had a landland phone ringing during dinner, except for pesky collection charitable and political solicitations.
@evermom1 I looooooove that book!!
I like staying connected to my friends. My equivalent would probably be Facebook, as I had a limited-minute TracFone throughout high school. I got Facebook in 10th grade after complaining that I felt left out. You go home, and that’s how you talk to people now. It’s especially nice in my current LDR…he’s only a few clicks away.
Limits on when he can use it are probably the extent of what you can do? I’m sure “family movie night means no phones” is a common rule for families who hold those, so that would be my next step, I think. 
@nottelling, you don’t need a smart phone to be able to text. Again, there is nothing in a teen’s life that necessitates a smart phone. I realize OP may not want the blowback that would ensue, but downgrading the kid to a “dumb” phone would eliminate the objectionable behaviors without affecting his ability to communicate with friends. And I’ll add that I completely disagree that the constant texting that is the heart of teen communication today contributes to closer relationships. The nuance and subtlety of vocal and in-person communication is completely absent in text messaging, and the content of most texts is trivial and shallow. I doubt anyone has ever had a meaningful conversation via text.
Middle son has a smart phone. He doesn’t take it to school. They have this thing called bring your own technology and there are times that the teachers will give the kids busy work to look stuff up on the internet… Anyway he doesn’t take his because then he doesn’t have to do that activity. lol.
" The nuance and subtlety of vocal and in-person communication is completely absent in text messaging, and the content of most texts is trivial and shallow. I doubt anyone has ever had a meaningful conversation via text. "
Well, I’m going to have to disagree with you there, MommaJ. Kids absolutely DO have meaningful conversations via text, and use punctuation and emojis to express the nuances. D and a good friend of hers spent quite some time the other day discussing her friend’s relationship with his new boyfriend. As one of his best friends, he really valued her opinion. This was all done by text. Not long ago, D was having a deep discussion about an ethical issue that had come up in speech class with another friend. Then another time, a friend who had a rough start in life was having a three-way discussion with D and another friend about his school performance and how much it means to him to have the support of friends since he got so little at home. All of these seem very meaningful to me, and in fact, I don’t see much trivial or shallow talk among the kids at all.
Texting is how kids talk. They don’t call, they text. And at least in D’s school, they talk plenty in person, enough that the teachers have had to create “quiet time”.
]
Kids can text w/o data. And there’s wifi.
I turned off BOTH my kids’ data plan. They groused at first, but they’re coping. Relying on wifi has keep the anytime indiscriminate usage under control.
WSJ reporter turned his cellphone service plan off completely went “wifi only” for 30 days
http://www.wsj.com/articles/do-you-really-need-a-wireless-phone-carrier-1425077991
I was very concerned about my kids and their laptops. They spent WAY too much time on them. However, when I started complaining about it, my younger son asked me if I would be bothered if that night I saw him reading a book, doing his homework, spending a little time on facebook and messaging his friends, and watching a movie on tv. I said, “Of course not.” Then I was informed, that was exactly what he had been doing, though it was all on one screen, the laptop. It’s just a matter of one medium as opposed to several. Funny how we think our kids are more well rounded if they are doing a bunch of different things, but not all on one screen.
As far as texting, I agree that you can have meaningful conversations while texting. When the information is there, I can’t forget it, and I can refer back to it. Sometimes it’s just better. My sister texted me today, and said that she was getting a biopsy for thyroid cancer. If she had called, I probably would have cried, and not remembered much of what she said. But since she texted, I could ask questions, get details, keep my fear to myself, and between the two of us, we realized that her symptoms were much closer to a common thyroid disease, not cancer. Hopefully we’re right. But without the text, I wouldn’t have remembered the information, and my emotions would have definitely not been useful.
I wont go on my rant about technology, but I feel your pain @
! I am glad to see I am not the only parent trying to enforce some rules with regards to technology. I have the no phone rule at the dinner table, and I limit it in the car, meaning when I am driving. I would like my kids to at least have a conversation.You can always set time limits within your router for their specific devices.
Eventually, I feel we will be a populace of hunchbacked adults, because everyone is always leaning over looking phones. I gotten so fed up, that I will not move over if I am in the path of someone who is looking at his phone, and not paying attention to where he is walking.
What kills me even more is that my single friends in their forties, say guys want to text all of the time! No one his forties grew up on cell phones, so it should be a given that conversation is expected.
Here’s the other thing. Teaching/Modeling appropriate tech/screen behavior is just another facet of parenting. You teach nutrition, hygiene, cognitive skills, etc. to your child for good later life routines/knowledge. You can and should also advocate for good tech/screen routines. Would you point out poor nutrition to the 16 year old that is eating a bag of chips twice a day? Would you point out that failing grades are not acceptable for school effort? Would you tell your 16 year old who doesn’t shower that socially and health wise not cleansing is not healthy?
Tech time is a life skill. It’s needed today for school, work, life. You can guide, model, teach, ask questions, etc. without taking the tech away. Taking away doesn’t teach management of the item it only removes the tool from life.
Addiction counseling? Seriously? Stop. Think about what you were obsessed with when you were 16. It’s entirely normal. When I’m on my phone, im usually not texting. I’m reading articles, checking up on news, checking my grades, checking homework assignments, checking college confidential, and I’m seeing what’s trending so I can see what’s going on in the world. It’s all the things that used to take you all hours to do back in the 70s and we can do in a few seconds. There’s so much information at hand now and it’s beyond me why parents get frustrated by it.
Perhaps sheltering your kids from technology for the first 10 years of their life wasn’t a good idea. I mean, that isn’t a good idea for anyone in general actually. Now that they have access to it, they want to keep it and not go back to the dark ages of their childhood.
I appreciate these comments, folks…they’re helping me think about this in a broader fashion.
one thing I wanted to jump on quickly - as several posters have noted this – but the theory that because we limited technology use in the 1st 10 years of our kids’ lives, that led to them becoming tech addicts in their teenhood. Two things 1) even though my kid is plugged into his phone way more than I feel comfortable with, his tech use is a fraction of what his using-tech-since-birth buddies do. Some of them can’t even converse in full paragraphs…i;m actually not kidding…so we’re way ahead of the game still. Honestly, I’m grateful that i was a hard-ass. And 2) That said, he’s jumped into it full-blast…no different than a 25-year-old guy getting his first cell phone in 2002…
I’m with you, OP. I don’t think restricting his use early on has created a monster. It’s called responsible parenting. I think now it’s just SUCH a difference that it’s probably not that bad – but just seems that way to you.
While someone posted that kids can have meaningful conversations via txt… my youngest recently realized that talking in person sometimes is a better idea. One of his friends who is a girl thought that because they were texting that they were actually dating…even though they didn’t act like it at school. He didn’t figure it out until she blew up at him for not texting her for a couple days. lol.
@SouthernHope, or a 50 something year-old mom getting her first cell phone. Though I did spend three hours on the phone this morning, I wouldn’t call that obsession. I was just trying to figure the thing out. Three hours!! You know what, it’s so easy to lose track of time on those things.
OP, I’m with you too on limiting technology in the early years, I did the same thing and tried to let up on things gradually.
I actually think too much time focused on screens when kids are very young may change the way their brains work. Once they are in HS it gets much harder to limit and I do think they need to learn how to use it and fit it into life with modeling from you. I worried about this a lot, I used to worry that when my S went to college the students would all be in their dorms rooms texting each other and not having real interactions, lol! I can tell you that I shouldn’t have worried so much. My kids are both very social and spend a lot of time with friends. Both of them have found groups of students who like to have board game parties. They have discovered all sorts of cool board and card games that they play with their friends in free time. Who knew this would be a thing? My S recently read “Moby Dick” on his phone, so much of the time when I thought he was wasting time he was actually reading! If your S is otherwise doing well, doing well in school, spending time with friends and participating in ECs I think he will gradually learn how to moderate and keep it in perspective.
I threw in the towel and got a smartphone last fall for my youngest child because not having one was affecting her school work. One of her teachers was group texting and updating the class webpage on the fly. My daughter had to rely on someone letting her know about changes unless she was going to sit at home on a computer monitoring things. She was the only kid in the class without a smart phone. My other kids have managed to go through college using wifi enabled ipods.
With all three of mine, I did not allow data while in high school. If they could find free wifi great, but I would not pay for data until they were in college. I figure there is no need to be on the internet other than at home, or if you can catch a free signal. I just turned data off on their phones.