Do you force your kids to play with certain kids?

[Anonymous]

"club!" kids having clubs and clicks at this age... they just mimic their mothers! Meanies in training, but how can we blame them?

[Anonymous]

Mary may have relatively weak social skills, but they'll only get worse if she is left out and given little chance to practice at such a young age. Poor social skills can be a self-perpetuating cycle and it's really sad for those kids.

Also, gradeschool playground "clubs" are mean spirited and exist solely to exclude and demonstrate status. I hope the teacher or school counselor can talk to the kids about why that's an inappropriate way to behave. You don't have to be best friends with everyone of course, but these "clubs" are unnecessarily hurtful.

[Anonymous]

Is this a private school or public school and which county? I want to avoid it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mary's mom is also not too socially skillful. Who says things like that to other moms? Work on your child's social skills. Buy her a cool toy maybe! Talk to the teacher, after all! But not the other mom who suddenly is obliged to make your daughter popular. Ugh.

PP, It is obvious you don't have a daughter with Aspergers or is socially shy. I never did ask any parents for help but, they could see that it was stressful for both my DD and me and they rarely went out of their way to be inclusive. Would it kill anyone to be nice and inclusive and not vote you out of the club because you are quiet?

I have a son who is pretty quiet. The good thing about him is that he is pretty independent, I don't think he follows kids around when they play without him.
It never occurred to me to ask other kids to include him, through moms or directly. Find other kids to play with!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have three kids, two boys and a girl in ES. My daughter is in 3rd grade. A parent I know (just from school, not socially) came to me to tell me (in a very nice way!) that my daughter was excluding her daughter (let's call her Mary) in school and he daughter was very hurt by it. It was awkward. They have been in the same classroom for two years straight and the little girl is sweet and well behaved. My daughter has never been friends with this little girl. She has three best friends (similar sports, lots of playdates, all the parents know each other very well). She also talks about a few other girls in class, but never this particular little girl. I set a conference with the teacher to get her perspective. The teacher said DD was kind to everyone in the school, worked well with Mary, but that she didn't believe they were friends. I spoke to DD and she told me that Mary is nice, but that she doesn't like playing with her as much as she likes to play with her friends. She also mentioned her friends think she is annoying because she follows them around. So my heart broke for Mary. I told DD that she should speak up for Mary, that her friends will like her if they play with her. She came back from school and told me she asked Mary to join her in their "club". She said Mary didn't say a word the whole time and that they voted as a club that they didn't want Mary in. Did I make it worse for Mary by trying to help? I spoke with my mom and she was adamant that kids need to deal with their social issues (that she never got herself involved in mine). Sigh.

It is ironic that your thread title says "do you force your kids to play with certain kids" but if you look at the bolded part, you can see that you very much do this already. YOU (and many other moms) force groupings/cliques/clubs by running your kids lives based on parent decisions. So when there is that very little time of unstructured play without parents (recess) - kids have a hard time being welcoming and learning how to socially make friends, be friends, and choose their own likes and dislikes.

The club part makes my stomach turn. I am not sure whose idea it was in the group but it is not nice and the girls know that. You need to nip this in the bud and get the school counselor involved.

I noticed this as well. It is unusual for kids to have such a tight clique in third grade. It seems parent-encouraged.

[Anonymous]

Parents at my e school started having after school ice skating parties and that kind of thing and inviting only a select group. They also formed exclusive scout troops limited by amount of space in pickup cars. The kids very quickly got the message about who they were supposed to be friends with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parents at my e school started having after school ice skating parties and that kind of thing and inviting only a select group. They also formed exclusive scout troops limited by amount of space in pickup cars. The kids very quickly got the message about who they were supposed to be friends with.

Wow this is sad. I live in a community where I can potentially see this happening. OP, I think the fact that your girl is part of a club/clique that votes people in and out is a bad thing and she's in for a lot of heartache if it continues. This sets the stage for future bullshit like infighting, competing for a boy, and slit shaming. You implicitly encourage it through the play dates and mom friendships. Having friendships like that is not bad per se, but it's definitely headed for drama, as we can see with the voting thing. I think Mary's mom was wrong to approach you though. As other people have mentioned, she should tell Mary to have more self respect and stop following around people who have no interest in her. It doesn't matter that these kids are in 3rd grade. Before you know it, they'll be teenagers and all these things will kick into high gear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok, so the club voting thing is not great, but I don't think OP's kid is a mean girl. I think she just doesn't connect with this particular kid. Presumably there are dozens of other kids that the other kid could play with, but she wants to be your daughter's friend for some reason. She's like those kids hanging around the fringes of the popular group in high school, trying to fit in, while ignoring the 200 other kids who might want to hang out.

Honestly, I don't want to hang out with just anyone. I have preferences when it comes to my friends. If I don't connect with you, I don't see the point in forcing it.

Now if every girl in the class (or soccer team or girl scout troop) was hanging and excluding her, there's a problem. But I don't see why we should force kids to be friends when they don't want to.

I agree. And all this also makes me think about how the "be nice to everyone/be friends with everyone" affects girls later when they start getting unwanted attention from boys. We all have liked people who haven't reciprocated our feelings of friendship or romance, and vice versa. It hurts. But it's important for kids to learn how to deal with it maturely and kindly from both sides.

+1 to both of these comments

[Anonymous]

OP UPDATE*** Ok, so I went to do Thursday folders this morning and spoke to the teacher while the kids were not in the classroom. She reiterated what she said before, that DD was a very kind child and that she worked well with everyone in the classroom, including Mary. When I told her about the club she seemed unfazed. She said that it is fairly common and that there are many children to play with during recess. She said that if Mary was having a problem she could only discuss that with her parents (basically she kindly told me to mind my own business). So this is as far as I go. I'll keep teaching my daughter to be kind and if the mother approaches me again I'll tell her to speak with the teacher. Thank you for all the responses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP UPDATE*** Ok, so I went to do Thursday folders this morning and spoke to the teacher while the kids were not in the classroom. She reiterated what she said before, that DD was a very kind child and that she worked well with everyone in the classroom, including Mary. When I told her about the club she seemed unfazed. She said that it is fairly common and that there are many children to play with during recess. She said that if Mary was having a problem she could only discuss that with her parents (basically she kindly told me to mind my own business). So this is as far as I go. I'll keep teaching my daughter to be kind and if the mother approaches me again I'll tell her to speak with the teacher. Thank you for all the responses.

Your teacher sounds like an idiot. You told her your child and a few friends formed a club, deemed Mary not good enough, gave her the boot, and she seemed unfazed?

Ouch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP UPDATE*** Ok, so I went to do Thursday folders this morning and spoke to the teacher while the kids were not in the classroom. She reiterated what she said before, that DD was a very kind child and that she worked well with everyone in the classroom, including Mary. When I told her about the club she seemed unfazed. She said that it is fairly common and that there are many children to play with during recess. [/b]She said that if Mary was having a problem she could only discuss that with her parents [b](basically she kindly told me to mind my own business). So this is as far as I go. I'll keep teaching my daughter to be kind and if the mother approaches me again I'll tell her to speak with the teacher. Thank you for all the responses.

But that's not quite right, is it? If Mary is having a social problem with the kids in her class then surely she can discuss it with her teacher and a school counselor.

I'm not sure the teacher is wrong to say that you don't have to deal with the other mom. But what worries me about the teacher's response is that the teacher does not seem compelled to take on this issue, either, to help Mary make friends in her class. The way it is presented here, it's Mary's responsibility to solve her own problem by talking things out with her parents, and the teacher is going to sit back and watch how things play out. I mean, no wonder why Mary is having problems in this classroom.

Mary is not "owed" a spot in this group, but the teacher should not be setting up and accepting a situation where four girls vote to exclude another girl and that's perfectly okay. Once it gets to the point that you're voting girls off the island, teacher intervention is warranted.

[Anonymous]

She said that it is fairly common and that there are many children to play with during recess. [/b]She said that if Mary was having a problem she could only discuss that with her parents [b](basically she kindly told me to mind my own business)

Wow, your daughter's teacher sounds questionable. Your daughter doesn't have to be friends with Mary, but students should not be allowed to form exclusionary clubs at school.

[Anonymous]

Were any of you ever kids? Jesus.

These girls aren't being "mean girls", they don't want to hang out with someone they aren't friends with, don't have activities in common with, and are now being forced to like. The teacher's response was perfect, it's not OP's problem and her kid isn't doing anything wrong.

The only mean girls here are the grown women who are name calling and judging a group of people they've never met based on an internet post.

[Anonymous]

These girls aren't being "mean girls", they don't want to hang out with someone they aren't friends with, don't have activities in common with, and are now being forced to like. The teacher's response was perfect, it's not OP's problem and her kid isn't doing anything wrong.

Wow. I have boys, and they certainly have preferences about who they like to play with, but neither of them would form an exclusive club at school and vote another kid out. One time a few kids at aftercare tried to do this to my younger son and the teacher dealt with it immediately. It's not OP's problem that Mary doesn't have friends, it is OP's problem that her daughter is involved in some ridiculous situation at school voting Mary off the island.

[Anonymous]

I don't think we should jump to the conclusion that the teachers not doing anything. She may not be telling the OP what's going on behind the scenes. She may well be working with her on socialization skills and she may be talking to the mom.