Back to school: Gadgets in kids’ back packs are worth £270 as total value more than triples to £3.2bn
Parents will be sending their kids off to school in September with more tech gadgets than ever before.
Each child's back pack will be filled with tech worth on average an astonishing £270, bringing the total value of British school kids' satchels to £3.2bn, more than triple this time last year.
Just under a quarter of parents surveyed by uSwitch said they would spend between £100 and £200 on gadgets such as smartphones, tablets, smartwatches and laptops, for their child to take to school, while a further 16 per cent would splash out between £200 £300. But a fifth of kids will be carrying tech worth more than £400 come term time.
While half of parents surveyed said technology would give their kids an advantage at school, almost the same number (49 per cent) said they thought gadgets would damage their social skills.
“As gadgets become more integral to our daily lives, it’s not surprising that parents want their children to have the latest technology, especially if it offers their child an educational advantage," said tech expert at uSwitch Ernest Doku.
“Embracing tablets and laptops in both the classroom and with homework can speed up research, as well as lighten the load with children carting around fewer books. But many parents are still concerned about how much kids are using gadgets, and whether it will impact their social skills in the long term."
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A third of kids rely on tablets for doing homework while one in eight use a smartphone, according to the survey of 1,000 parents by OnePoll.
Parents are most concerned that children will become too reliant on spellcheck (57 per cent), technology will shorten their attention spans (50 per cent) their handwriting will get worse (48 per cent) or that their maths skills will be affected (46 per cent).
Half of parents will still be spending money on new technology for the start of term, spending on average £134 per household.