Well, if your kids are slightly older, you have the opposite problem: everyone older than 12-13 tends to want to play on Java. My oldest is right on the cusp where his friend group is split down the middle.
I have had Bedrock kids over and they crossplayed with my Java kids using GeyserMC [0] on my server, which tickles the inner nerd, but there are always minor glitches.
We currently use the linux minecraft launcher which has worked pretty well up to now running bedrock on linux. It's the best bedrock experience, but this change is concerning.
This [1] here. Sadly, the maintainer has had enough. It still works for the latest minecraft I think. It runs so nicely on linux - far more processor efficient than the java version, and runs even better than bedrock on Win10. I'll be sad when it stops working, but will probably just 'hold' on an old minecraft version at that point.
Mods is part of it, but the biggest reason my 12 year-old insisted on switching to Java is because he says redstone behaves differently.
He'd try to recreate a cool build he saw in a book or online, and get super frustrated when it just wouldn't work in Bedrock edition.
However, I feel that also highlights the importance of network effects. There's a huge amount of content in guide books, wikis, online tutorials, YouTube channels, etc., and the majority of it is targeted at Java edition.
It's super dumb.