How do "cool kids" become "cool"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
This topic is culturally relative as who gets labeled cool or popular in a given public city school vs. suburbs vs. small town vs. rural is undeniably variable based on the value systems of that culture and the visibility of the larger social dynamics (community status of family, wealth of family, community involvement of family, etc.). Add private school into that mix and it's another level of contributing social factors. Add boarding school....
The social structure of OP's query was not explicit in that regard. It can be rather painful to be on the fringe if you want to be in the thick of it, but as many parents have shared, if a kid is not invested in that, they can be genuinely cool and even popular regardless of their objective or subjective-perceived social standing.

There is research on this topic, but do know that there is less research in higher SES communities. If you areANy reading research on this topic, do look at sample population/research methods.

Socially, this cool kids grouping starts young. Sadlly, kids are noticing the "differences" at younger ages.
Extraversion/extroversion absolutely contributes. I have worked with many wonderful, charming children who checked all the boxes for being "cool" but were introverted in social settings.

Early childhood contributing factors: Attractive, tall, confident, funny, charismatic, neuro-typical kids get social feedback in the form of positive attention from others starting by at least age two. When their tiny peers start to notice and participate in this dynamic is when parallel play transitions to cooperative play. Remember that? The more socially aware kids seek out the other social/cool kids. I have observed it many times. Like attracts like. Anyone ever been told their child is a "sought after playmate"? To various others' points in previous comments, there is usually a social maturity in these kids via having older siblings or cool parents. (another thread?)

The early childhood piece is partly out of the control of parents, but likely a combination of genetics and environment. Like everything else.
Kids may be relatively unaware that this attention is happening and may not consciously notice until they are older. By then, they are accustomed to and bolstered by the years of positive attention.
Boom! Popular/cool kids.
This easy early popularity can easily get derailed by trauma, beauty that is only skin-deep, emerging mental health issues or learning challenges.
My personal experience....looking back, I knew I was "popular/cool" but was unaware of outside perception....in part, because it had always been this way.
The book "Class Matters" might be relevant here.

Much more to say but trying to keep it to early childhood.

Love to hear so many parents opining that their kids are popular because they are friendly and kind. These are enduring qualities that make for a better world in my personal opinion.

I agree with this. I don't think it's the parents' actions necessarily, or maybe to a limited extent, but I think it's a genetics factor. If the parents have these traits, then the kids may have these traits. It's less social engineering and more genetics. I think that can be a tough pill to swallow. I have one kid who had been effortlessly popular and then was derailed by ADHD as he got older. He's still derailed and we're working to get him back to a good place (not a popular place, just better).

[Anonymous]

I was popular but not necessarily "cool," although I recall wanting to be. I was told by multiple people in multiple circumstances that I had the ability to move from group to group, have friends and be comfortable with a very wide range of people. I usually had 30-40 friends at a time from middle school on.

But in third grade, I recall having very few friends. I complained about it to my mom, who told me to just ask people to talk about themselves and to listen well. That $hi+ worked like magic on other kids, and suddenly I was at least friendly with everyone.

Even today, I am 4 people's best friend, have at least 15 close friends, and a wider circle of around 50 people who I communicate with regularly.

Most people have neither the time nor energy for this. I think even as kids, a lot of them find this level of social interaction unsustainable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have one very popular kid. I don’t know if he is cool but he is smart, confident and athletic. He has a lot of friends.

I have one shy kid who is smart and athletic. He has one friend who is very good looking and seems to be popular with the girls.

Both kids aren’t “cool”. I’m not sure if they are the “cool” crowd or if that even exists in elementary.

What’s the difference between cool and popular?

IMHO, popular is having lots of friends, being well-liked by everyone
cool is having that thing where people want to be like you, are impressed by you, having the right particular (not necessarily large) friend group

In school, kids often say popular when they really mean cool. There are cool kids that are not very well known by the student body. They might be called popular, but they actually aren't; they are cool.

When I was in school, I was popular. My brother was cool. But he was "considered popular"

YMMV

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, OP is probably at a private school. This does not seem like a public school thing. At least not at my public school. Thank God.

What, there no popular kid cliques on public school? Sure, ok.

Not really. The middle schools are too large. Cool Kid cllques only work where everyone knows everyone else.

True

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, OP is probably at a private school. This does not seem like a public school thing. At least not at my public school. Thank God.

What, there no popular kid cliques on public school? Sure, ok.

Not really. The middle schools are too large. Cool Kid cllques only work where everyone knows everyone else.

True

I do not agree with this. MS and HS not considered small here, and yes there are popular cliques. 100%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Only in the minds of people like OP.

I have been to private school, my kids have been in public schools, there are no cool/popular at that age. There are in middle and high schools, but again, it's only a subset of the student population that cares about this. Most students know that popularity isn't "important". Most students want to fit in with a group and have friends. Groups are porous and overlap. The weird notion that there are "nerds" and "jocks" only exists in movies. In real like, it's very fluid.


And God help any parent who cares about this! You don't need to be "popular" or "cool" to have friends.

Oh, please. There were cool kids in elementary school back in the day. Some were girls who developed earlier, some were really athletic boys, some had cool older siblings. And there were cool kids on Day 1 in middle school—everyone saw it. They had the right clothes, knew older kids, whatever. Stop pretending that no one cared about popularity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My DS is in 4th and there is definitely a cool group, particularly for girls. For the girls, it has nothing to do with their parents or social engineering. They're the girls who appear to be aware of their looks (not in a sexual or precocious way or anything but in more a groomed fashion way) sooner and have grasped group dynamic skills faster. I think it's mainly the group dynamics skills. I personally was late bloomer to those skills and it showed.

For the boys, it's mainly the sports bros. My own DS is not a sports bro but he's totally fine anyway.

While I am aware of this through his teacher and the school counselor (DS has ADHD and has contact with her), we're not at all concerned with it. It's all good.

I'm sure it depends on the school, but this is our child's school too except there's definitely social engineering going on. The girls who are "cool" are from one particular neighborhood that is wealthy. Their moms are active in the PTA and friendly with each other. From K, they signed up for the same activities together.
For the boys it's what PP wrote exactly. They don't play on the same teams or the same sports but they are the ones most likely running the soccer game or basketball game at recess.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parents and social engineering.

This is the answer. Although, my kids' school does not really have cool/popular to the extent others do. I think it has something to do with the fact that it is very, very diverse. The kids are (not perfect but) pretty accepting of each other.

However, I participate in this actively. For two reasons:
1. I like a certain group of moms. We became friends in K, our kids became friends, and now we're all becoming "family friends" which is lovely and a great way to grow up IMHO.
2. This kid group is somewhat nerdy. That's who I am, that's who my kids are, and I think that's the way for them to have the social support they need.

In a different school these kids may be considered dorky or unpopular, but I'd say even if popularity exists to some extent, they are close to the top. Idk why.

In case anyone is wondering, we are not UMC, I'd say solidly MC. We all work.

My only problem with this is that you're actively leaving out kids with families you don't know. It's sad for all the other kids. It's sad for parents like me who moved here after K or were really busy with work and didn't have a chance to participate in PTA/other activities until this year. I see that you're already friends and that even though I've tried, it's very clear that you're not interested in making new friends.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parents and social engineering.

This is the answer. Although, my kids' school does not really have cool/popular to the extent others do. I think it has something to do with the fact that it is very, very diverse. The kids are (not perfect but) pretty accepting of each other.

However, I participate in this actively. For two reasons:
1. I like a certain group of moms. We became friends in K, our kids became friends, and now we're all becoming "family friends" which is lovely and a great way to grow up IMHO.
2. This kid group is somewhat nerdy. That's who I am, that's who my kids are, and I think that's the way for them to have the social support they need.

In a different school these kids may be considered dorky or unpopular, but I'd say even if popularity exists to some extent, they are close to the top. Idk why.

In case anyone is wondering, we are not UMC, I'd say solidly MC. We all work.

My only problem with this is that you're actively leaving out kids with families you don't know. It's sad for all the other kids. It's sad for parents like me who moved here after K or were really busy with work and didn't have a chance to participate in PTA/other activities until this year. I see that you're already friends and that even though I've tried, it's very clear that you're not interested in making new friends.

+1

I am the poster you are responding to, and this is not true. You mentioned being busy with work. I mentioned that we all work and we have busy lives, too. We are very accepting of new people and if newer adults and kids mesh well we are happy to include them in our hangouts.

Of my friends, I am the only one active in the PTA. I go up to new moms all the time and engage with them. Anyone who was nice and wanted to be our friends 100% would be. I don't know where you got that from. Maybe you think this group of nerdy kids excludes less nerdy kids?? No.

[Anonymous]

Ours formed at our local pool club in middle school. Cool kids were all on the swim team together. There were a few social engineers that orchestrated things and most of the teammates who were social with laid back parents that let them spend all day at the pool got sucked in. Other teammates who were a bit more awkward or not around as much weren’t shunned but not quite part of the cool crowd. When they all went to middle school together the group expanded to include friends of friends, including non swim team kids. It was fascinating to watch it evolve from the world of simple ES friendships, especially as a parent of a boy who previously had no friend drama. I don’t really know the whole social scene at their very diverse public middle school but definitely sense for a certain demographic this group is at the center of things.

[Anonymous]

Being socially savvy, advanced, earlier puberty development combined with usually having more access to the interests of older kids (music, social media etc).

However, this isn't always good at younger ages. Being precocious and daring often leads to poor choices. I'll take a nerd any day lol. My daughter seems to check a lot of the above boxes but she's not super interested in the cool kids (she's in 8th grade). She says the cool kids skip school and are now dating, drinking, vaping, having sex. These kids were "cool" in a regular way in 6th grade. Its interesting. I read this and it makes sense:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/privileged-pressured/201809/middle-school-popularity-can-backfire-over-time

[Anonymous]

Fourth grader in public and it definitely happens in public! Agree with many PPs that I do not see any parental engineering in my child's milieu. Most parents hardly know one another.

The "cool" crowd mostly have older sibling and, as a PP, said are precocious about awareness of their appearance, music, certain accessories. For what it's worth, I was NOT this kid at all and hate that my daughter (youngest of four) is in this volatile not particularly nice crowd that gets lots of attention, positive and negative, from others. My engineering efforts are 100% to steer her away from it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They tend to be good looking and have money. They often have deeper roots in the community. Being outgoing helps as well -- introverts by their nature are less likely to be "cool."

This. I’m seeing this with my two DD’s. Older dd is an introvert and pretty quiet. She is well liked and has a surprisingly large friend group, but she’s not the leader.

Younger dd is super outgoing and is friends with everyone, and everyone knows who she is at school (even teachers/admin) because she talks to everyone.

[Anonymous]

I worked at the same preschool both of my kids attended - so I literally followed quite a few kids from preschool through HS. I can tell you that the pecking order and personalities start to take shape at three. It seems a combination of confidence, coordination, an outgoing nature on the part of both parent and child, grooming and ease at which activities are picked up. Then, on top of a child’s disposition, there is always one child that begins to decide who plays and who does not. It is pretty much as simple as that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The kids are asking each other as dates to the 5th grade dance? Aren't dances at that age supposed to be about everyone just being there together? I would be more concerned about this than who is cool--this seems way too early to start worrying about who has a date and who doesn't--they shouldn't be "dating" at that age.

FWIW, I was most definitely NOT a "cool" kid, but even I remember passing "will you be my boyfriend/girlfriend" notes in 4th-5th grade. Totally meaningless, we didn't go anywhere! But this was a 1980s public school.