Monitoring texting elementary school

[Anonymous]

My 5th grader has begun texting friends from her class on our shared family ipad. I read all the texts. There are 2 girls from her class that do nothing but stir up drama. Constantly. It's really upsetting my daughter and causing issues at home and school. For example, at school the girls are sitting at lunch and one is dipping her fries in mayo. My daughter says, jokingly, "eww, gross".
That afternoon, drama girl A texts in a group chat "Larla, we need to talk RIGHT NOW. what you said today was so RUDE. It made me cry! Why did you have to do that? I am sooooo upset!" And Drama girl B (pot stirrer) will say "OMG Larla, not cool".
These girls have their own iPhones to text whenever. My daughter does not have her own device and I only allow her to use the iPad 1-2 times a day for 15 or so minutes to text when she has downtime. She is rarely texting in real time. For example today she had after school activities and then we ate out. weren't home all afternoon and come home to all these dramatic texts.

So then my daughter says sorry it's no big deal, I am sure I eat stuff you think is gross, didn't mean to hurt your feelings, etc., and is worried about the fighting and drama awaiting her at school the next day. Teacher is involved in school drama but not texting stuff.

I can tell my DD no more texting but then she's worried about what's being said without her. Ugh. This is too much. I hate girl drama. My daughter is not causing the texting drama whatsoever. We talk about how tone can't be understood over texting, how to word things nicely. I'm trying to teach her to communicate nicely but it's hard when everyone else isn't.

I can tell by these girls postings that their clueless parents are not reading their kids texts. I can't tell them to read them, can I? It's getting out of hand IMO. I am not friends with the girls parents. This is 5th grade, elementary school by the way.

[Anonymous]

What idiots these girls are.
I have a non-texting 5th grade boy, with his friends, they can all be extremely mean to one another, but in real time, real conversation, face to face. Apparently it's all good fun and so far feelings have not been hurt.

I would talk to DD about working on being calm and not stressing about this drama. Make her see the ridiculousness of their overreactions. I think it's an excellent exercise for keeping your head cool while others are losing theirs. You're doing a good job, OP!

[Anonymous]

My kids are not in 5th yet, so I may be missing some nuance here. It seems like the straightforward, easy solution to this is no more texting at all. Her friends can have texting drama amongst themselves and your DD can speak to them at school, in person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kids are not in 5th yet, so I may be missing some nuance here. It seems like the straightforward, easy solution to this is no more texting at all. Her friends can have texting drama amongst themselves and your DD can speak to them at school, in person.

OP yes, I am leaning that way. It just feels like yen I'm punishing her for something she didn't even do! It's so frustrating.
Maybe I'll just restrict her from communicating with these particular girls. They are on and off as friends every day. Hard to keep track of. Ugh!

[Anonymous]

Why does your 5th grader have a phone and texting capabilities. Your fault mom.

[Anonymous]

Maybe have a texting break until the end of the school year. Once school is over they may be a bit nicer to each other when they aren't seeing each other all the time.

[Anonymous]

This is why I made my DD diversify her friend portfolio - when one set were not working out I'd nudge her towards other kids. She never even realized she was too busy for the problem kids.

[Anonymous]

OP here. As I said, my DD does NOT have a phone or her own device. These other girls do. My DD uses our shared family device and I monitor her texting which I began to allow after she showed me she could be responsible.

Like it or not, from my understanding most kids get phones in middle school and begin texting. When my daughter asked about it this seemed like a way to teach her about online communication by talking about it together and me helping her manage it by reading and limiting access.

In terms of diversifying her friend portfolio- yes we are doing that as much as we can. We are new to the area and at a small public school with not a ton of girls in the grade. I'm anxious to move on to middle school where there will be a bigger pond for her to swim in, friend-wise. My daughter is also somewhat shy and anxious which is a bit of a hurdle in meeting new friends. We are working on that.

[Anonymous]

I am all about teaching DD to stand her ground. No one is allowed to tell you about yourself.

That said, my read is that school is a jungle, and my DD needs tools to make it through. My entire adult job had something to do with the fact that I could deflect criticism. I wish I could do that in school. If someone said something to me like something was "rude" or "not cool," as an adult, I had to defend myself. It means being sure of who you are and not being afraid of telling other people about the hard work you're doing.

I don't believe that your limiting text time is going to minimize the attacks. She is caught up in a bully loop and I personally believe she has to stand her ground and be the bigger bully to get herself out of it. Not hurt other people, but stand up to people.

[Anonymous]

Texting has nothing to do with it. When I was that age, girls did the same thing but via passed notes. Your question should be how to handle relationship dynamics not the texting issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why does your 5th grader have a phone and texting capabilities. Your fault mom.

You have a reading comprehension problem.

That's your fault, moron.

[Anonymous]

I see two separate issues here.

First, I think you need to explain to your daughter that even joking about what another person eats is not appropriate. The drama you are speaking about started with your daughter hurting another child's feelings, even if she did not intent that to happen. Your daughter needs to understand her role in this situation, which it sounds like she does because she said she was sorry. Talk to her about how this is a lesson learned for next time.

Second, texting is an easy way for girl A to let your daughter know she did not like what she said. It is likely much harder for girl A to speak these words - texting gives her strength. I don't think girl B should have been involved and I do agree that adds to the drama. But again, the initial joking about food by your daughter and response by girl A is not drama - it is an exchange of unkind words started by your daughter.

Please don't take this as an attack on you personally or your daughter. I just want to provide an outsiders perspective based on the information you shared. I think it is fine to allow DD to text with her friends and it is great you are monitoring the texts. Use this is an opportunity to teach DD how to interact differently with her friends.

[Anonymous]

I have a sixth grader and we don't allow texting. It's not that hard. Just don't do it.

And your daughter needs some social skills to build up her resilience, and perhaps you need to back away some too. I don't see anything egregious in the communications from the girls you describe as "drama girl" and "pot stirrer" - they are doing exactly what your own daughter did which is to express their opinions of someone else's behavior. Not a big deal.

[Anonymous]

Your 5th grader doesn't need to be texting esp with drama queens. Just end it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. As I said, my DD does NOT have a phone or her own device. These other girls do. My DD uses our shared family device and I monitor her texting which I began to allow after she showed me she could be responsible.

Like it or not, from my understanding most kids get phones in middle school and begin texting. When my daughter asked about it this seemed like a way to teach her about online communication by talking about it together and me helping her manage it by reading and limiting access.

In terms of diversifying her friend portfolio- yes we are doing that as much as we can. We are new to the area and at a small public school with not a ton of girls in the grade. I'm anxious to move on to middle school where there will be a bigger pond for her to swim in, friend-wise. My daughter is also somewhat shy and anxious which is a bit of a hurdle in meeting new friends. We are working on that.

OP, you also posted in the original post, "I can tell my DD no more texting but then she's worried about what's being said without her." It's time to work with her on learning not to care what's being said about her by kids who are not nice. Yeah, that's hard, but if she can learn it now, and learn that she does not have to text etc. to have a life, then she will be better prepared for MS and HS years. My DD's friends who made it through MS the best were the ones who were confident that their real friends would not engage in this crap, and who didn't text with kids who pulled this drama.

I like the idea by a PP above of telling her -- and you tell, you don't ask -- that a break from all texting (even with nice friends) is in place for what's left of the school year. I'd do it for the summer as well.

The fact that other kids have their own unmonitored phones now and many more will have them by MS--why does that matter in your own choices for your child? If you don't want her having a phone, then no phone; if you don't want her texting on the common iPad, then no texting. It's a good thought to try to introduce her slowly but it's backfired, and truly, she may actually find it a relief to be told what is going to happen rather than being given a choice or told to "work it out." She can then say, "My parents are saying no texting for a while," and yeah, if she wants to throw you under the bus a bit with her real friends, that's fine too as long as she's not snarky or disobedient with you. Kids do want boundaries, even if they say otherwise, and in a case like this --where she knows that there's drama and it's hurting her -- she actually will probably be glad on some level that she can say, "Sorry, I can't text anyone at the moment."

Definitely steer her towards other kids, as you say you're doing. I can't stress enough how much it helps if a kid has an extracurricular activity that is not related to school, not AT school and does not involve kids from school. It enables the child to build some friendships that have nothing to do with school-day drama or who said what to whom. If your daughter doesn't have an activity, or the ones she has aren't really engaging her, then go online with her to find some terrific summer activities that really interest and engage her. I know my DD has a couple of classmates who don't do anything other than go to school and then come home to text and go on social media, and they tend to be kids who get sucked into drama both on social media and at school, especially since the texting and online drama is coming from kids they must see at school every day.

Ensure that over the summer your DD sees a lot -- in person -- of her real and positive friends, and in the fall, if you do choose to let her text, tell her she has to limit it, and has to create a list of names for you of the kids with whom she'll text. Be willing to say, "Sorry, you can't text with X, she showed last year that she's just not able to text without being unkind," and then stick to that.