5th grader with no friends
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Anonymous
| He's clearly an introvert. That's fine. We're often misunderstood by the adults growing up. I remember my mother harping on me about not going to this school dance or that all through school. I would get asked to go, but I just didn't want to go. I couldn't wait to get home. I wanted to stay at home and do my art, relax, dream. It wasn't that I didn't like my classmates, it was that I didn't mind being on my own. To this day, I always have a million things to be doing and I get them done. I'm still comfortable riding solo at almost 60 than being a part of your social swirl. I don't need the group to build me up or sustain me. Solitude sustains me. I don't feel any FOMO. I can be alone, but I'm never, ever lonely. Maybe this is your son, too. If your son isn't worried about it, then you don't worry about it, either. Leave him be. Don't make him feel like a weirdo by acting all verklempt about it. A calm, quiet exterior often hides a very active internal life. And yes, I'm a creative. |
Anonymous
As you get into your teen years, there should be less hanging out overall because you are in higher level classes with more work. Plus extra curriculars or a job. Again, I wouldn’t move a child with ADHD to an overcrowded public. |
Anonymous
| Just sad that we have to make this choice. My kid reads high quality novels, learns math on paper, has history and science textbooks, and no friends. At the public school he got a bunch of woke excerpts, chromebook lessons, plenty of youtube videos but he had friends. |
Anonymous
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My son is slightly older (middle school) but similar; he has inattentive ADHD and really just doesn’t seek out socialization. He goes to private because public was too overwhelming for him. My husband does lament the lack of neighborhood friends, but my son really doesn’t care. One thing that has helped is before social situations (or even before school started) we remind him of expected behaviors and point out that you have to join in or say yes if you want to build friendships, even if you don’t necessarily want to. He has social skills and can use them when he wants to, he just only does so with people he is interested in v all kids. We are talking about social expectations and what you need to do to be polite, but also point out that each person has a level of social need or a limit and if yours is low, it’s okay for it to be a few friends and family. The positive side is he has a very strong sense of self and not as susceptible to peer pressure.
I do think there is a difference between public/private school populations. Dependent on the school, but our private is much more sheltered; fewer classmates have phones or Apple Watches than his younger brother in public, and there are more restrictions on social media (however many of the kids have AdHD, so possibly this is the reason). I will also add that my son has only started texting his friends this year - he has had a iPad for 2 years but never used it to socialize. This year he is much more interested in keeping in touch, which seems fairly common across boys (the girls are much more social). |
Anonymous
| 5th grade is a tricky time for some boys, especially if the boy is not overtly athletic. Boys at this age are not really deep “friends”, they are playmates. Boys that seem to have a lot of “friends” are mostly just interested in playing the same things. Many boys often don’t have the emotional depth to have a true friendship until later in MS (of course there are outliers and girls are different!) I would try to get him involved in some kind of long term activity that is low stakes and individual while still being in a group (martial arts/ taekwondo/ karate/ juijitsu/rock climbing/track/runners club/ summer rec swim team). Then he can feel like he is part of a group simply by showing up. Also a great confidence builder. Same kids for many weeks, if not the whole year. I wouldn’t worry too much. Plan some hangouts, make sure you have some good snacks, fun activities (ping pong, basketball). Finally, don’t pathologize him not having a go to best friend. It’s ok. He’s ok. He will have friends in his life at some point. |
Anonymous
| *also limit things like video games if he is playing by himself. They just pull kids more into themselves. Volunteering is good. |
Anonymous
OP here. He was at a small private - think one class per grade from 1st-3rd grade. We moved for a few reasons but one was to give him more social opportunities. While that didn't exactly happen, he is far more engaged in the community (participates in lots of things from sports to music to tech) and does better with the more challenging academics. His private now is 'bigger' - like 4 classes per grade but classes still small. I could see him benefiting from public socially but academically he seems to really benefit from the private environment. Tough call. We are not rich so private is a major financial sacrifice that we do to help him succeed. We do have other kids all at public. |
Anonymous
OP here. I wish this was the case. He never wants to be by himself, is always 'bored'. Often will play with his younger brothers but it ends poorly because he gets amped up. Also enjoys playing with his younger brothers friends but always sports. If they do something chiller like a board game, he will get upset and rarely joins. |
Anonymous
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Op, I have a difficult child with ADHD so I say this with a lot of empathy—your child is clearly doing something that is annoying to other kids, and that’s why they don’t have friends. If this has now happened at two schools, your child is the problem and you need to focus on that and not the school situation.
My oldest DC is now in 6th grade at a small private school, and had few friends until last year/this year. DC has ADHD and their impulsivity made them annoying to other kids. We spent years supporting DC to take a social skills class, do individual therapy, I did parenting classes, and DC is medicated. I love (love, love, love) my child, and I see their many strengths, and love their enthusiasm for life, but could also see how their behavior could be annoying. It was annoying to me, and to their siblings. I could see how kids who have a choice of who to play with would choose to not play with my kid. We also thought about leaving the school, switching to another, larger private, moving to public, but in the end we realized that the problems my DC had would follow them everywhere unless we supported them to built better socialization skills. It has paid off, and DC finally has multiple friends and regular friend groups to hang out with. It has been helpful that their school expands size in middle school so DC has new kids that where they got to make a “fresh start”, so I think switching schools can be a part of the solution, but only if your child has worked on their behaviors. |
Anonymous
You seen your kid. You've seen other kids. We haven't seen your kid. Is your kid honestly a regular kid? |
Anonymous
If he had good friends from summer camp or sports or something outside school then I would gravitate toward school being tough. Otherwise, it may be that he is on the spectrum. The only other thing I could think of would be dysfunction at home, which could impact his ability and desire to get close to other people. |
Anonymous
Ok, so the above tells me that his ADHD may be impacting his emotional regulation (maybe highly impulsive, gets carried away easily/ goes from ok to upset really quickly). He maybe would benefit from a group therapy (run by speech path or psychologist) where kids need to work together on something during the session. This is where you sometimes see breakdowns with having to work with others and BIG emotional reaction. It’s basically social skills but more collaborative and works on perspective taking |